Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Two Race Weekend

Memorial Day Weekend I wound up with 4 days off. Our building was closed on Friday, so I was left with a freebie day off. :)


On Friday, I went and saw Sex and the City 2, in the afternoon, when there were only a handful of others there. OK, so I had to take my 16 year old daughter, since my friends were all at work, but it was worth it.


Saturday morning, I ran the Odin Sesquicentennial 5K race. At 8am. In the heat and humidity. My only goal for this race was to NOT run my slowest 5K ever.


Result: Pass! I ran a 32:18, which is very close, but not quite my slowest ever. The course was ok, just the right amount of sun and shade, but the weather was so hot and so humid that I was just glad that it was over.

Saturday afternoon, I spent at my BFF's house for a girls day in. Ang, Barb and I spent the day drinking margaritas and eating chips and salsa. Yum!


One more race- Herrin has their Herrinfesta Italiana over Memorial Day weekend. The race takes place on Memorial Day and is a 10K. I knew what to expect, as I have done this race many times before. As usual, I had talked myself out of how bad it was. I'm good at that selective memory when it comes to race courses. My goal for the race was once again to NOT run my slowest 10K ever.

Result: FAIL! I ran a 1:14. My slowest 10K prior to Monday was 1:05. The race is one giant loop, most of it taking place in the hot hot sun. And, let me tell you, it was HOT on Monday. I think it was in the mid to upper 70s at the race start, and humid. I was miserable and just didn't care that it was a race. I just wanted to get it over with. And, finally, I did. :)
So, even though I failed at my goal, I was not disappointed with my time. I really didn't care.

My friend C had her grandson there and wanted me to come out and run the 1 mile race back with him. I've run with him before, he hasn't quite learned to pace himself yet so there is a lot of walking involved. I agreed to help, and wound up getting in another 2 miles- one out to the 1 mile start and then the mile back.

After the race, we went to G's house and took showers and got ready to go out for lunch. Who would have thought that every place we decided to eat would be closed for Memorial Day? We were on a wild goose chase! We tried 3 different restaurants- all closed. Then, there were signs up all over talking about a wine and arts festival that was taking place Memorial Day weekend. When we found the park where the festival was to be held, we saw one last truck packing up one last display. Ugh! Seriously, isn't Memorial Day a part of Memorial Day weekend?

We were all craving pulled pork, so we finally settled on a little hole in the wall place that was actually open. So disappointing. The barbecue was dry and not very good. The side dishes all tasted like they were served directly from a can. Yuck!

Later, we went to a Southern IL winery. That made up for the race fail and the lunch fail.
It wound up being a fantastic day, I'm glad we stuck it out.

5 comments:

Delane said...

I'd kill for a 32 min 5K this year. Just sayin'

Hey, at least you were out there for the 10K.

Al's CL Reviews said...

I'd kill for either time, but understand what you mean as it isn't a good time for you.

MMM Margaritas.
Boo on the FAILED BBQ.

Aka Alice said...

Running in the heat and humidity will slow me down too. Same thing happened to me last year at an IronGirl 10K...I think I finished in around 1:15 and it was about 80 degrees at race time. Brutal!

Diana said...

Time is just time......you were out there doing it, which others can only dream about.
Good job on the races with what Mother Nature gave you!

Christy Z. said...

You did back to back races! That is way more than pretty much everyone. Time shmime.

And look on the bright side, for the next 10k goal...you have 9 more minutes of wiggle room to NOT run your slowest 10k ever. :)

ps. Christy = Jo :)