The title of this post is misleading, "My first and last 5K." I know that sounds negative, but the experience was so positive that I will never repeat it. I did so well on the 5K that I will never run a 5K race again. I will only run 10K's from now on.
Honestly (and aren't I always honest here?), the day before the race I was so nervous that I had bowel issues. I thought I was surely NOT going to finish. I was so happy that I was feeling sick because at least I would have an excuse if I actually didn't finish the race. I pictured myself telling people when they asked how it went, "Well, I was getting over a stomach bug, so I did my best."
I felt ill-prepared. After all, I hadn't made proper time to train for this race. I was busy sticking to my weight lifting regimen and having fun in boxing bootcamp and a new class at Crunch called "ass & abs". The most I could handle running on any given day over the past 4 months was about 1.5 miles, just under half the distance of my impending 5K. Also, I was not regulating my asthma very well because I was being cocky and not taking my maintenance medication -- each week I felt fine when I was doing my workouts, so I stopped taking my meds, and then about a week later I had to get back on them and also take my rescue inhaler. Needless to say, the race was on my schedule, but training for and being physically prepared for it was not.
Thankfully, I ran it with my sister-in-law, who had been taking training seriously, and who enjoys running. This being the first race for both of us, we stood excited and nervous at the starting line together. We hugged, jumped up and down a little bit, wiggled our way as close to the front as possible (just behind the 9-year-olds who intended to smoke all of us and run 6-minute miles or less), and got each other pumped.
As we made the first turn, I was so glad to have a running partner to help me at least finish the race. As we made the last turn, I think we were both kind of sad that the finish line was approaching. We ran across, got better times than we thought we would, and turned to each other and said, "I wish we had signed up for the 10K! Next year we'll go for it." We hugged, we jumped up and down a little bit, wound our way to the coffee truck, and felt very, very good about ourselves.
I remember my first 5K. I was 17 and I wasn't training for it at all. My old school was hosting it in honor of an Ensign killed in a car crash right after graduating, and I decided to sort of jump in. Needless to say, I did horrible and I actually blacked out at the end. But that experience motivated me to join the half-marathon club at my school and when I left, I was in much better shape to join XC and Track. I'm still a fan of my 1500m though lol I did one 10k (in track) and got so stagnant because it was so unlike XC, where at least the scenery changed. I can't wait to hear more about your running as well!
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