New Year's Day 5k

Sure, it's a little late, but I haven't written a race report for a really long time, so I had to get it in here.After we had registered for this race, I realized that I had only done a total of two races in 2008 (not counting the virtual races). There was Boston in April and the 1 Mile Race in August, and that was it. I did a lot of running, made a lot of progress, reached an awesome goal, but only ran 2 actual races. So, I was really looking forward to racing again. I sort of felt like a newbie again. A little bit of nervousness before the start, but after the gun went off, it was all familiar territory.

This race was a lot of fun. We had Lani's sister and her family in town for a visit. Her husband, who has really gotten into running last year (and gotten really fast, and possibly more obsessed with running than I am), also ran it with his 16 year old son. Lani and my oldest both ran the mile, with the youngest in the stroller. My daughter got to try out her new running shoes she got for Christmas (unfortunately, she was a little grumpy that morning and didn't actually do a whole lot of running).

The race started in Papago Park and headed out along a canal in an out-and-back course. My goal was to keep my mile splits under 7 minutes. I felt that was pretty attainable despite only returning to running from about a two month layoff about 3 weeks before. That turned out to not be much of a problem with all three splits being around 6:40. I was pretty surprised when I only counted about 11 runners ahead of me at the turn around. A couple sped by me shortly after I made the turn, but I caught both of them before the finish (I also caught up to Lani and the girls as they were finishing the mile. I could tell my daughter wasn't too happy as I got no response to my cheering her on). I ended up with a time of 20:42, good enough for 10th overall and 1st in my age group. Not too shabby. I really wasn't expecting to be first place. But hey, I'll take it. It wasn't too long before my bro-in-law and his son finished. My nephew was obviously feeling it, but his dad enjoyed a nice easy run before his first marathon, which took place on the 3rd. I was actually going to do it with him until I hurt my knee and had to postpone that idea. Sorry about that. That race didn't go as well as he had hoped. He started feeling really sick the day before, and still wasn't feeling good during the race, but he still did it! The first time is always a learning experience. I'm just glad it didn't turn him off from marathons. I still want to run one with him someday. His new rule: "Never eat egg salad sandwich the day before a race."