A word about me

I feel like last Saturday was a great milestone for me--I finished my first 5K in almost a year! My fab running buddy Mary did it with me! But before I divulge the details of the race . . . 

A moment to reflect

Remember when I posted on here back in February (or maybe even January) that I was so sick of being tired and sick, and well, generally unhealthy? (due to a certain child added to my family in the past 15 months!) And I resolved to begin eating better, exercising, and other things? Well guess what, I HAVE! I am really proud of myself. Ever since I went off to college I have been a regular exerciser--but having a kid really put a hold on that for me for a while, especially adjusting to wrestling  season and continuing my own job, blah blah blah. It's really not a good excuse but it blindsided me and health fell by the wayside! It's no wonder I was sick with bacterial infections 3 out of 5 months last fall! Ridiculous!

So in February I signed up for a 5K and resolved to start watching what I ate, making green smoothies, and actually training for the race! Which, 3 months later, I am really proud of myself for actually doing! (although if you want the truth a big part of my motivation was that either I really did it or continued to not fit into my clothes!! ha ha) I really stuck to my training schedule, and it almost made me cry as I was about to cross the finish line last Saturday when I thought about how hard I worked to be able to run that far. FOR REAL! There were a lot of days that I would rather have done anything else but bust out the jogger or drop Ash in the daycare at IAC. But I did it anyway! I have been running 3 days a week every single week since I started training. In my world that now revolves around snacks and naptime, that is a big accomplishment! 

I have also been so much better about what I eat! Well, to be honest I wasn't even giving it a second thought at all through last fall and winter. But I have been now! And that combined with actually making green smoothies 3 days a week... I've lost over 5 pounds. (that is a big deal to me!)  woot! Just sign me up for the Biggest Loser! ha ha. But it's nice in so many ways. And... that's really all I have to say about that.

Back to the race. . . 

It was the Famous Potato! It was actually a full marathon, half, 10K, 5K and 5K walk! So needless to say it involved about a billion people! Mary just moved here last year  and had never lived in Idaho before so we thought it was the perfect first race to do in Idaho! We did a little (as in, like 3 or 4 times) running together in the weeks leading up to it but mostly got ready on our own. Like I mentioned before, some of those ridiculous mornings I really forced myself to run! 

Anyway, back to Saturday. The only bad thing about the race happened in the first like, 7 minutes. The 10K and 5K started together which meant it was a huuge crowd. And the problem was once we got to the Parkcenter Bridge, there was a huge bottleneck of people trying to cross it! The annoying thing was that they didn't really request that walkers start in the back, and a bunch of walkers had started in the front, so by the time we got to the bridge (which is only like 3 people's worth wide), we came to almost a standstill. And it is a long bridge! We didn't want to just stop so we ended up just bobbing along, jogging almost in place as we slowly made it across in the huge masses! It was funny, but also really annoying! The beginning of the race is the best part, and it was ruined because we couldn't even run! So we decided we better make up some lost time once we got off that stupid bridge. And from then on we went FAST! (Meaning fast enough no speedwalkers could pass us--which is fast for us!) We picked up our pace and then never really slowed down. I was really dying until we got to about mile 2, then I seemed to finally warm up and the last mile went really well. We sprinted at the end! Our time on the board was 35:00, but we figured between taking the "bridge incident" and the fact that the disposable timing chips they used were actually all activated at the same time and not when you actually crossed the starting line, we really did it in about 31-32 minutes. Which is one of my best times for sure, definitely faster than I had been going training for it! 

When we crossed the finish line Collin, Ashlyn and Jon were all there cheering for us! We hung around and had some cold, yucky baked potatoes.... but they also had good food, especially my favorite at all these races, chocolate milk! And the rest is history. It was a good time! And in case you want to know, I have made a goal to try to run a race like that (or maybe I will branch out and try one a little longer..... knock on wood about stupid shin splints) each month over the summer. I've already got June and July lined up! So get ready for more race posts, they will be coming!