May 30, 2006
Now THAT is how I wanted my first race to go. I think I’m going to call the Run with Nature my practice 5K and the No Excuses 5K my first real 5K.
Yesterday, Jesse and I headed out to William Land Park in South Sacramento (Hexe spent the night with her grandparents) for the No Excuses 5K. I definitely went into this one with a bit of a different attitude. First of all, I kept sort of forgetting about it. We were pretty busy this weekend, anyway, and all of a sudden it would hit me at times, “Oh yeah. I’m doing a race on Monday.”
So, I didn’t have a whole lot emotionally invested into this race. I got everything set out and ready the night before and tried to go to bed at a decent hour. It was just tough because A) I wasn’t that tired and B) Again, I just wasn’t excited about it. I wasn’t dreading it either, but I think I was afraid to get excited because of how the previous run had turned out.
So, I got up at 6:00 on race morning and headed into the bathroom to get ready for the day. Jesse got up shortly after me, came in and asked me if I was excited. I told him, not too much.
I showered, slathered on the sun screen, deodoranted up and got dressed. Headed into the computer room and futzed around on the computer for a bit before making myself breakfast (Egg white omlette: egg white, 2% cheese, tomatoes and jalapenos). Grabbed my gear and headed out the door.
We got to the park, scoped out some parking, then walked over to the green and noticed that there were definitely a lot more people at this run, than were at the previous race. I grabbed an orange slice and a water from the table, then hit the restroom. We watched the kids race, and I started to do some warm-up stretches. We studied the map so that Jesse could figure out some good points to run to to get pictures of me while on the course, and before I knew it, they were talking about getting on our marks and going.
I ran the entire race, this time. I still have my “First 5K” mix on my iPod and even though I’m “supposed” to walk the first song, I decided to just run it and slow down later, if I needed to.
I didn’t need to.
At the end of the mix, I had to do some song manipulation to get away from the slow, cool-down songs and into something faster to get me through the rest of the race, but that was no big deal.
Being by myself out on the course, I was able to immediately get into the music and get in my own zone without worrying about the other folks who were there. I was aware of them, on the “don’t crash into them” level, but that’s about it. I slipped into my zone and just ran. The music did what I had programmed it to do and what I was accustomed to it doing for the past two weeks. I ran to the tempo and had arranged them perfectly. Bad Religion, Awake, Whatever and Faceless gave me the appropriate boosts of energy, even at the end when I was so ready to quit.
I came around the curve near the finish line and was able to see the clock and saw that it was still under 45:00. Hell, it was still under 44:00! At the same time I realized that, a couple of women that I’d been going back and forth with throughout the race passed me. I had two thoughts, nearly at the same time. The first being: “Holy shit! I can finish this under 44:00!” and the second, regarding the women who had just passed me, was “Oh, no way.” and with that, I sprinted to the finish line, passing both women and coming in when the clock read 43:49. However, I didn’t cross the start line until 23 seconds in, so my finish time was actually 43:23.
I let out a big “Yeahhhhhhh” after crossing the finish line and Jesse came up with a water for me. I hugged him and nearly burst out crying: “That’s how I wanted the first race to go!”
So, it was pretty much perfect.
We hit the booth area again, grabbing me a couple of more orange slices and a couple of waters and as we headed back to the car, I couldn’t stop talking. “That was perfect. God, that was awesome. I ran the whole way! I didn’t even walk! This is why running isn’t a team sport. Man! That was great!”
It was perfect. I had a fantastic time and really, seriously, can’t wait for the next one now.
Oh yeah, I’m hooked.