Oct. 13: Town of Oyster Bay Supervisors 5K, Oyster Bay, NY
The morning started off a bit cool so deciding what to wear was challenging. I opted for long pants, short sleeves and arm warmers. Those arm warmers have become a real favorite part of my running apparel. I almost always seem to overdress, so they are handy when I no longer need long sleeves! Got to the race with time to spare so I got a chance to do a warm up mile. I met a colleague of mine and another runner in my age group. She is speedy and even though sh always beats me I appreciate all her encouragement at the races! The race course was very pretty but quite a bit of a challenge! It was about 1.5 miles uphill, a short downhill, about another 1 mile uphill and then about a flat .5 mile finish. I got to the finish line with a bit of 'heavy breathing, huffing and puffing but not horrendous. I had to laugh once I crossed the finish line. I was trying to compose my breathing and a very elderly lady kept asking me if I was sure that I was okay. I was great! I like my time: 27:17 @ a 8:47 pace. Considering it was a hilly course I was more than satisfied with my time. It was a good thing that awards were 5 deep! I came in 4th place out of 13 in my AG. 94th out of 284 women! I was only 37 seconds behind first place! I was definitely happy with this race!
Oct. 21: 4 miles Blazing Trails for Autism, Bellmore, NY
It turned out to be a bit warmer than the last race a week ago. So this time I wore shorts, short sleeves and my trusty arm warmers. Yes, I really do like wearing them! My planning time in arriving at races has also been working out well. I think the regularity of having time to pick up my number and t-shirt, warm up etc. helps take out any stress before the race. I have been doing the same routine and that is a definite benefit. I noticed when I got to the race I did not see my usual AG competition. That took out some of the race day jitters although it seemed to be quite well attended since I did do a bit of driving around looking for parking. Chatted with a young woman about our similar teaching issues and such and before I knew it......2 minutes until race time. I said my goodbye and headed to the first few lines back of the start. I have also gotten better at placing my self at the start. And then...the gun...and we were off. I decided to listen to my nanno at this race. And ironically, for whatever reason (perhaps karma coach?) it was playing only 2 songs!! At first I tried fiddling around to change it but could not see! LOL! So, I gave up and just listened to the 2 songs for 4 miles! I saw one of the women in the AG below me who is fast and usually places so I once again decided to pace off her. After about 1 mile I noticed another women in my AG right in front of me! I passed the 1 mile mark at 8:15!! Whoa!!! I stayed behind her for about .5 miles and then I felt like I could no longer stay behind her and passed her. Then I passed the other woman and just kept running my pace. It was obviously faster! I passed the 2 mile mark at 16:55. I hit 3 miles at 25:55!! I could not believe I was flying that fast! No one was with me and I ran alone until about the last .75 miles. Then the younger woman came up beside me and took off. I could not catch up to her. Once again, no one around. Then I finally saw the finish line and heard the crowd (they were quite loud!). Just as I reached the line two really young woman crossed it with me. I kept it up and kept running over both timing mats and turned to receive two high fives from them! Nice race! Got my drink, my food and got my official time: 34:37!! 8:40 pace!! 1st place out of 8 in my AG!! 64th woman out of 377!! And...193rd out of 695 runners!! Awesome!! It really is nice to collect all this hardware!! LOL!!
