5 Minutes Happier.

1:43:40...that is my official time for the 10k race I walked in yesterday. Which is 5 minutes and 20 seconds slower than last year. But I do have to say I am much happier with this years time, and this years race in general. For starters after being sick and not working out for a few weeks and thus not knowing if I would really even be able to do it at all, I completely removed any goals I had. Well I did want to do it around the 2 hour mark, but really finishing alive was my goal. This year I did the race with a friend of mine who walked with me the whole way. We talked, we admired other peoples running outfits, others pre-race prep, we stopped and took pictures, we thanked the cops who were stopping traffic for us, we encouraged and commended the women pushing the double stroller with toddlers alone, we stopped and posed for pictures for my mom and dad who came out to watch and cheer, we thanked the volunteer who told us we looked beautiful about halfway through (I'm sure he said that to all the females who went by), we decided free margaritas/mojitos at the finish line would encourage us to move faster more than the free beer did. And pretty much we just enjoyed each others company.

And we stayed consistent. Last year I would get ahead of myself and try to run for a little bit and then get so tired that I would then go really slow. And since I didn't run any this year (well there might have been an intersection or 2 that there was traffic at that I decided to cross quickly cause I felt bad for them) I didn't have those periods of extreme slowness. We maintained a pretty consistent pace. Officially the pace was 16:42/mi. However my GPS runkeeper says I walked 11.17 km and has a pace of 14:57/mi. 

I am a little sore today, that is for sure. But truly not that horrible. Trying to plan out the next "race". Maybe Silverton Hospital's Fun run in May. If not, I know I will plan on doing the Turkey Trot here in mac in July.