First 5k ever!

Thursday was my first 5k. It was at 6pm in a town about 20 minutes North of where I live.  I woke up early, packed my work out cloths, packed a high protein lunch, and made sure I had everything I would need.  I went in the bathroom at work to change before heading up north only to discover I had forgotten socks! Luckily a girl at work had an extra pair, but it was not a good way to start the evening.

I had plans to meet my friend at 4:30pm and we would head down to the race to get situated and settled. At 4:33pm I get a text from her saying she is running late and cannot meet till 5:30pm (remember the race starts at 6pm). We decide to just meet at the event and I walk .80 down to the race. Thankfully she got there to meet me at about 5:50pm. There were opening announcements and moments of silence and we discovered 6,500 people were participating.

After all the runners had passed, the walkers could start. There were so many people I was immediately frustrated that I could not go at the pace I wanted to. During mile one I was able to run a few times, and I felt bad blowing by people, but overall it was very annoying. All I kept thinking about was I had looked forward to this for so long and now I am having the worst time ever. When we finally got to mile 1 the woman yelled out “twenty one minutes good job guys!”TWENTY ONE MINUTES?!!!?? I have been working my ass off since March and I average a 17 minute mile at most!

Mile two was much more tolerable. I was able to run more and the crowdedness thinned out. I had way more space and I could move a lot faster. My friend stuck by my side the entire time. She ran when I ran and she was right there with me every time I did a quick move around someone slower. At about 2.5 miles I was feeling great. My mood had improved and my motivation was in full gear.

I finished the race in 54.14 minutes and honestly I am okay with that. I am very happy with that. When I first started training I had it in my head I wanted to complete the race in under an hour. Since my training has improved so much over the past couple months, I somehow got the number of 46 minutes in my head as a finish time. Considering how slow my start was -which was totally unavoidable, I am more than fine with 54 minutes.

Overall the experience was great. Between the socks, my friend being late, and my frustrating start, it was still awesome. We ran to the finish line and I could not believe I had completed this goal.

We hung out for a little while and walked around the event. The amount of unhealthy food being served was insane. There was an entire tent of just cookies and brownies. I was shocked. My friend and I got these cool new waters called Karma and chose not to eat.

I made the decision I was going to walk back to my car to burn some extra calories. So I hiked uphill .80 miles back to my car. At the end of it all I burned 682 calories and I felt like I was hit by a small train.

I am absolutely blown away by all the positive comments on my facebook after I had a post about completing my first 5k. So many people wrote about how amazing I look and that they cant believe I did a 5k. So many people told me how proud they are of me, even some people I never thought I would say hear say it. I am still in shock over the amount of support I have received and I am the happiest I have ever been in my life right now. I have a four mile walk on Sunday to fight against hunger and I can not wait!! J

 

 

 

After my first 5k

 

As the walkers start