The Great Race

Last weekend I made a weekend trip up to see Matt and Tiffany to enjoy the splendors of Searcy Arkansas. The Saturday before, Tiffany called me and asked if I wanted to run in a 5k on Saturday morning. Initial reaction is..umm..no. But the more I thought about it, I've been working out and even running a little bit, but the last time I ran 3.1 miles in a row was...well...we might have in baseball, but its been a while. I said if Matt was in, I was in. So she signed us up.

So the week leading up to my trip, I tried twice to run 3 miles on the treadmill and the first time made it 2 miles and the second 2.5 miles and I thought, I could do it. So Saturday morning came, 2 full training sessions and I was ready to go. Of course, it was cold, not like the DFW weather I was used to. But that's ok. The best part of the whole deal was that I got to wear a number on my shirt, we were official. Ironically enough my number was 111, so slap a small c shaped curve at the top of the first one and it's 911, hope that's not a sign....

We all gathered at the start line and I was a few deep and Matt was at the front. As soon as the gun sounded, we were off, and Matt was in the lead, for a few moments, but he was in the lead. I started off at a good pace, fighting the cold air and Matt came back to me after a half mile and we finished the first mile in a little over 8 minutes! Holy crap...I think I might die. So Matt and I kept on as Tiffany pulled away. The first mile wasn't too bad, we loosened up and felt good. As we made a right turn halfway through the second mile we started into a nice head wind!! Not a good development for two guys slightly out of shape. So we looked at each other and decided to start drafting each other. I would lead for a minute, then Matt would lead...we were geniouses! So we made it to one more right turn and out of the wind and just as we made that turn it was on to mile 3! They handed us cups of water and, being the experienced runner I was, almost drowned in my cup by drinking while running. But I recovered and we had one more mile to go! Feeling pretty good at that point, I started to feel something in my foot. (I didn't think much about my shoe selection. I bought some new running shoes for casual wear and didn't want to pack 4 pairs of shoes on the plane, so I figured I run in those new ones and not the shoes I had been working out in.) So the slight uncomfortable feeling turned into a sharp pain and sure enough, I had a monster blister coming! But I would not let that ruin my first official race. So I trucked on. Matt and I started pumping each other up, we were going to make it! Just as we got to about 2.5 miles we noticed a girl in the ditch, folks had stopped to help her, so we kept going, but she had been hit in the shoulder by a passing car and it knocked her over, she was ok though. A little bit down the road, that girl...passed us! So at this point the indescribable shooting pain, moved to my left foot too, 2 blisters!, this isn't good, but if that girl can keep going with a broken wing, then I can make it. Tiffany, being the loving person she is, held back a little bit and wanted to finish with us. So around came the finish line and we start sprinting..my foot is screaming, but I don't care, this is great!! .and everyone is cheering..wow this is great! I must be finishing at the top, why else would everyone be cheering me so? Well...we all finished under 30 minutes, which is very good in my opinion, I was very proud of us. Tiff finished 18th among girls and I finished 24th with Matt at 25th. We are even on the internet....check it out.....
The thing I was most proud of was being able to stand up afterwards and the only damage was to my foot! And walking proved hard the rest of the weekend, but not bad for our first race..it was fun.

There is a picture out there with us and our numbers, I'll post it when I get it.

The rest of the weekend was great. Watched Perko play in the alumni soccer game, checked the night life in Little Rock and played some mean raquetball Sunday with a mini tour of Harding. I have a great brother and sis-in-law. We always have a great time.