Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Last One...I Promise

Posted by CheapRunnerMichelle
I am sure the last thing that any of you want to hear about today is another Forest City Road Race recap...so I'll try and make mine short and sweet (but no promises...k?!?)

The 2012 FCRR was my 1st race ever, and I did the 5km distance....and it SUCKED big time.



I had not really trained properly for it (aka. maybe ran 3 times in the 4 months leading up to the race). It was painful (as you can see from my furrowed brow above...that and the fact that I could barely lift my feet off the ground)...but somehow through all that misery, I caught the running bug.

So now fast forward a year to the race that started it all...

This year I decided to do the 10km distance...with a LOT more training under my belt :)

I got everything all laid out the night before



We were up bright and early, and after a bowl of cereal, we were off to the races (literally)

Moi and the kids saw CRM & CRR off for their 8am start



Then the kids and I had about an hour to kill...so we walked to McDonald's, so they could get their morning fuel



My sis-in-law & her kiddo's met us, and we were off to cheer on CRM & CRR, for a strong finish. We met up with them about 15min before my race began.

My turn now



Where's Waldo?



And we were off...right away I settled into a comfortable pace, ensuring I wasn't too quick out of the gate only to lose momentum later. Immediately I started having iPod issues...but finally got that all worked out, just before the 1km mark. I like to find an unknowing victim pacer during the race, and thought I had found that in some guy...but at about the 2.5km mark we were on the heels of a large group of gals running together (and kinda taking up the whole road), and I had to make a decision...do I stay with my "pacer" or pass the pack in order to maintain my pace...I decided to pass and jumped up onto the grass in order to do so. Now what do I do?!?! About another 0.5km up the road I settled in behind my next victim pacer. She kept looking over her shoulder wondering if I was going to pass her, so I settled in beside her and told her that I had decided she was going to be my running buddy today. She told me that she normally runs with her friends, but that they were doing another distance that day - I said ME TOO. That was all the talking we did as we ran the next 4km together. I lost her at the water station as we turned the corner in UWO...so alas I was on my own for the rest of the run. I was able to maintain my pace all by myself, and just kept chugging along. I tried to offer words of encouragement as I passed others who looked/sounded like they were struggling (I remember being in their shoes last year)...I rounded the corner for the home stretch...and had quite the cheering section (and a personal paparazzi - thanks CRR for the pic)



I sped up to finish out the last part of the race - after my words of encouragement, and was pleasantly surprised to see on the clock...that if I really kicked it into gear I was going to be able to finish 3min ahead of what I had hoped for...yippee!!!

Finishing strong


It was a GREAT race, great weather, a great day to be out there running!

Thanks again to the organizers and volunteers of the 2012 Forest City Road Race!!!

PS. Why have my friends never told me about this place, and how awesome it is?




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