I ran in another 5K this past Sunday. Even though I’m a slow runner, I enjoy doing races for a few reasons – to get an official 5K time, to pace myself with other runners, and for the ability to run faster than I do even on the treadmill – to name a few!
This race sounded fun to me because it took place inside! Everyone knows how hot it has been recently! So the race was advertised that it was not only inside, but underground! And it would be 68 degrees throughout the race. Not being from around here, I wasn’t sure what sort of place was located underground, but was quickly informed by many friends that it was in a cave. A race in a cave? Sounds great! It turns out that the cave is actually a subsurface warehouse mined in limestone owned by Meritex Enterprises.
The race took place in what looked like a parking garage that was built into the cave. I am not in these pictures, but you can see what it looked like:
Ok, I actually am in that last one.
Now, a few months ago I started doing the Couch to 5K program (for the 3rd time). I started with week 3 day 3 in February, which required me to jog for 90 seconds, walk for 90 seconds, jog for 3 minutes, and walk for 3 minutes and then repeat. I remember being thrilled that I could jog for 3 minutes straight! On Feb 27 I first began saving my times. That day I did a 5 minute run, 3 minute walk, 8 minute run, 3 minute walk, and 5 minute run. In 31 minutes, I completed 2.16 miles – a pace of 14:21. At my first 5K race on April 1, I finished with a 14:18 pace. I had hoped to be able to run that entire race, but I did not. At the Mother’s Day run I was able to bring my pace up (down?) to 12:25 with a finish time of 38:33.
For this week’s race my goal was 36 minutes. Sadly I didn’t meet my goal. My time was 36:14! That’s another 2 minutes and 17 seconds faster than last time. Maybe I am getting better at this running stuff? My pace was a nice 11:41 – faster than my normal treadmill pace (yesterday I did 3 miles with a 12:14 pace on the treadmill).
I hope someday to be able to run a 10 minute mile. I get discouraged when I see how fast the race winners run – there is no way I could run a 5 minute mile, much less 3 of them in a row! (Ok, that was a 20 yr old male who ran that fast – the fastest in my age group ran at a 7:19 pace!) Of course, I’m not running to win. I’m just running to improve, get faster, and build stamina. I’ll need the stamina for the half marathon in November!