This 5K benefitted Operation Comfort which helps out wounded veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan. Those brave heroes lead out the run with a 1 minute head start. Racing wheel chairs, and blade runners running under the stars and stripes was an impressive site to see.

Then came my time. I was shooting to come in under 27 minutes. My training and diet hadn't been the best over the holiday break. Not to mention I had rolled my ankle on Monday so I rest it the rest of the week. So I wasn't expecting anything to magical, but thats what I got. Perhaps it was the site of the wounded veterans out there running with us. Maybe it was the challenge of a friend who told me to gun for 25 minutes. Or it could have been the chilly crisp temperatures keeping my body temp in check. Or finally it could have been the young lady who passed me at mile 1 who served as my rabbit while setting what I considered a nearly homicidal pace. Whatever it was it all added up to a good way to start the year.

I took off at a pretty good pace. I knew this because my Garmin kept chriping at me to slow down. Shut up Garmin what do you know, I'm going for it today. So on I pressed. Thanking the veterans as I passed them and just enjoying what really was a beautiful morning to go running.

Before I knew it I was coming up on the water station which is just under a mile into the race. Cognizant of the fact that I was feeling good and had a PR within my grasp, I bypassed the water station. Soon after my Garmin beeped to let me know I had put the first mile down in 8:19.

The 2nd mile was uphill for the first half, and a pretty steep uphill at that. It was at this time a young lady passed me. Unbeknownst to her, or perhaps she did know, she became my pace booty. She was running faster than I care too so I just latched in behind her by about 15 feet and paced myself off of her. I swear she figured it out about mile 1.5 because she picked up the pace, but then again we had also started heading back and were going downhill so against my better judgement I matched her pace. She truly was the perfect rabbit as she was running faster than I really wanted too, but not slow enough for me to let her get out of range. My Garmin still telling me to slow down and me still arguing that it didn't know what it was talking about. Then it beeped at me again to let me know I had put the next mile down at 7:42. Unbelievable 25 minutes seemed doable and a new PR wasn't out of reach for me.

Now doubly dedicated and running the downhill and flat section of the course I matched my running muse stride for stride over the last mile. It was an exciting yet lung searing moment as I turned the corner to head for the finish line. My Garmin had perpetually beeped at me telling me to slow down (I have since deactivated that feature) as the young lady finally began to put some distance on me. I heard my Garmin go off but didn't want to waste time looking down to see how fast I'd turned the third mile. By now I could see the finish clock and it was ticking 23:3X. So I grit my teeth and finished strong, and hit the stop button on my Garmin. I knew I had set a PR, but was just above puking threshold so all I could manage was to walk around and catch my breath for a minute.

Finally looked down at my watch to see 23:45 which blew away my old P.R. by a little over a minute. I was extremely happy with my time. Wanted to find the young lady and thank her, but then thought about how creepy stalkerish that might seem so I decided against it. But many thanks to her for setting a brutal yet maintainable pace for me.

Afterwards I took advantage of some breakfast tacos and water. Shook the hands of every veteran I could find and thanked them for their service. Got in my car and headed out prouder, and yet more humbled thanks to seeing the sacrifices some made for our freedom.

Nothing everything went better than planned.

Went to Lowe's home improvement and picked up 600 lbs. of topsoil and compost. Went home and spread that and laid 2 full pallets of St. Augustine grass.


Nothing


If you are in the area you should definately run this one. It is a great course, very well organized, great swag bag, nice little expo especially for just a 5K. Great food, and most importantly you get to run with some bondafide heroes.