The Sandy Sprint

Let me paint a little picture for you mmmkay. I am not one of those people that can say "yeah, I remember being seventeen and being able to run for miles without feeling a thing." No, in fact, while I was being forced against my will to attend gym class, I would do everything I could to skip the day that we were to run the dreaded mile. However, when I wasn't so lucky to evade it, I was almost always one of the last ones to finish at an impressive seventeen minutes. Oh how I hated to run, and...well, move in general.

So, you NEVER could have convinced me that ten years later I would be willfully signing up to run a 5K without being dragged, drugged or forced in any way. However, I have been working really hard to get in shape and challenge myself physically, so I thought this would be a fun way to start.

I could have trained harder, but I still feel really good about how I did the day of the race, and now I have a good base for how I'll do for the many races that I will hopefully run in the future.

I ran with Banna and Stacey, who were so much fun to enjoy the occasion with. When I woke up at 6 in the morning that Saturday all I kept doing was asking myself "what the heck am I doing, I have no business running a 5K!" But, when we got there, the energy was so high, there were a ton of people, and I was very happy that I went. It was really cool putting that number on and taking stock of all the different types of people running the race. Some were serious runners there to compete and best their times. Other people were there for the cause, and supporting family. I was also surprised to see some people running it in jeans and shoes that were clearly not designed for running! The race was for Ovarian cancer, and we saw a lot of runners who were either survivors, family of survivors, or running for someone that they had lost. It got me thinking that I really want to find more races to run for a disease that has touched our family. The weather could not have been more perfect for the occasion and we finished in well under an hour, I was so surprised at how much of it I was actually able to run. It was definitely one of the coolest things I have done in a while, and I was on a high the whole rest of the day. I can see how people who run marathons really look forward to the next one.

I have a picture of the three of us before the race with our t-shirts on, but for some reason I can't get it on my blog. I'll work on it.
We're in the distance sprinting towards the finish line. When I finished Jayda gave me a hug and then asked me why I was so wet and sweaty.

Wooo Hooo, I finished! It was so cool to see all three of our husbands and kids waiting for us at the finish line.



The race went through such a pretty part of Fairmount Park. The Please Touch Museum is right behind us.

After the race we checked out some of the festivities which included free food and drinks, face painting, sand art, tattoos etc. Lots of fun.