Mother Road 5K

Joplin held it's own little marathon for the 2nd year.  The plan was to go out and support some friends, but at the last minute I found out the company I work for sponsored the 5K portion of the event and had a few slots left to fill for FREE.  Seriously, you can't pass up a free run right?  (Ha, even though every day is technically a free run)!  The downer was that no strollers were allowed, but B said he would watch Mira while I ran (and skip running himself) so that was appreciated!!  We left the house with plenty of time to get there, then as we are on the way I realized I forgot my number and chip - oops!  So, we went back to get it and they dropped me off as close as possible to race start about 10 minutes before the gun.  Oh well, who needs that last bathroom break anyway.  I was in the back of the pack and didn't realize how many people were in front of me.  I knew my actual time would be based off my chip anyway so I didn't worry about pushing my way to the front.  Once I hit the line I started running and realized I had made a mistake - it was a serious traffic jam for the first 1/2 mile.  I weaved and hopped and swerved my way to clear territory and finally found my pace by mile 1.  At about mile 2 I began to question if that pace had possibly been a little fast, but I saw a friend up ahead and made my way towards him.  The way back was a slight incline and into the wind.  The friend slowed, but I was able to maintain.  I kept up pace through the finish and was pretty happy with my time...considering.  To put it in perspective this is my first 5K after giving birth 14 weeks ago that I was not pushing a stroller.  Pushing a stroller a couple weeks ago on a hilly course I ran a 30:45.  Not pushing a stroller on a flatter course with lots of traffic my chip time was 25:43 - whoohoo!  There is progress!  Hopefully once I get off the extra 10-12lbs of baby weight I'll be able to shave off a couple more minutes.  (fingers crossed!)

Some interesting tidbits about the race:

1.  I was 2nd in my age group (35-39)

2.  The top 3 women were excluded from age group wins

3.  Two of the top three were in my age group

4.  I was ranked 7th woman overall (clock time)

5.  By chip time I was 6th woman overall

6.  The only women's age group I would not have won (besides my own) based on chip time was 25-29

7.  It was a 25-29 overall winner

I'm not trying to point out that I rock, but that women in my age group ROCK!  Who said it's men that get better with age!  I won't even get into how many men this age group of women beat.  ;-)

Till next time - run on!