We went up to MD to visit my family again (2nd time in two months! woohoo!) for Thanksgiving, which happens to be my most favorite holiday ever: good food, family and friends, and TURKEY TROTS!
This is actually my very first Turkey Trot! The Alexandria Turkey Trot 5-Miler. Thanks to Shonna (my BF since F), she
forced encouraged me to sign up! And since I was persuaded to sign up, I of course had to force Joel to run it too. LOL
The whole week before was pretty hectic. Shoot, the Sunday before Thanksgiving we had just done the St. Augustine half marathon – our second half in 16 days... not to mention those were our first two halfs EVAR. So there was the recovery, plus the impending sickness (crud) that was looming over me. No amount of apple cider vinegar could push it away, it was bound to happen. I put my body through hell and now it was time to pay.
So I got sick before we left to drive to MD. I was a worthless second driver because I just couldn't stay focused or awake. And my voice was pretty much toast. Throat scratchy and coughing. Blah.
The morning of the run was cold! My dad dropped us off in Alexandria - the cute Dey Ray area. It started at a school. Then we met up with Shonna and Paul and made our way to the start - among the other 5,000 people! Tons of racers!
The gun went off and the mass of people didn't really budge. It was super crowded. It was probably a good minute before we even made it to the official start line. Joel took off and I stuck with Shonna in the beginning. With the super huge crowd, comes the weaving in and out. Sucked. It was funny though because as I was doing my weaving, someone came up next to me and said, "... ... so you're ignoring me?" And I looked over and it was Joel! LOL I didn't acknowledge him at first because I figured he was way ahead of me. I guess he did more weaving than we were doing.
Around the 2nd mile, I noticed the distance between Shonna and I kept growing larger! She looked back at me and I waved for her to go ahead. There was no way I was keeping up with her – the one in the beginning who said she was lucky to do 10 minute miles!! Haha! Her easy pace is my fast pace. :) So once I stopped trying to push myself, I eased down to probably a 10 minute pace myself and just kept at it. The crowd never really thinned out. In fact it was a romper room most of the time. Especially since they allowed dogs and strollers in this race. We saw some kids almost get clotheslined by dog leashes. :\
There were a few hills, which were hard but welcomed since we have virtually no hills in Savannah. Gotta get them when ever I can! I was pretty beat by the end of the race. The last straightway was long... I didn't know when to pick it up for my strong finish, so I don't even think I ever did. I felt my hips ache and I wasn't in the greatest condition to even try to PR for this 5-miler. I think my time was 47 and a half minutes. Not bad. My first 2 miles were sub 9s, thanks to speedy Shonna! haha I had a great time and it was a ton more fun doing it with friends!
Hopefully this will be the first of many Turkey Trots to come!
