Heritage Festival 5 Miler

The power of adrenaline never ceases to amaze me. Sure, I'd run that fast in the winter, but not in 75 degrees with 70% humidity! My goal going into the race was to beat my time from last year. I like to know that I'm making forward progress. Of course, this wasn't too difficult because last year's time was based on my 2nd road race. Now that I had a full year of running under my belt, I should expect a bit more, right?

Boy was it humid - sticky skin, hair that frizzes immediately - you're sweating before the gun goes off. Speaking of the starting gun, there's never much of a warning and it always scares the heck out of someone. I mean, we know it's coming, but then we get to talking, and pretty soon "BANG!"

So we're jogging along and I'm looking around at all the scenery, taking in things that I swear I'd never seen before. I'd been down that road I can't count how many times, and yet there's always something I miss, something that makes me say, "Oh, so that's where that is!" Ok, maybe it's not the best time to sight-see, but I use that to take my mind off of how tired I feel - at least until I warm-up.

Everyone went out WAY TOO FAST! And yes, I got caught up in that too - my fastest lap was my first. I knew I was running too fast, but people were whizzing past me. I didn't want to be at the back of the pack! So I tried to keep up, but I let a lot of people go. And although I don't remember everyone I passed later on, I like to think that I passed all those people back that passed me on the first mile. :)

I met up with a father/daughter team on mile 2, and we exchanged a few words - very nice! I ran with them for the next two miles, as they were going at a pretty good pace. At mile four I decided to pick it up a bit and finished a little faster than the previous two. Yippee! I ended my run out of breath (just as it should be), and felt as though I gave it pretty much all I had. I was pleased with my average pace and overall time - beating last year's pace by over 40 seconds per mile!

Huh, maybe I am doing something right! :)