Worcester Fire Dept. 5k

Since this summer's theme is to reduce, I decided to join Rudi and some other friends at the Worcester Fire Department's 11th annual 5k.

Trying to "reduce" makes me do things that cause me to end up looking like this:

It's not an entirely pleasant picture, but I matched my current mile PR (12:19) even though I was going downhill. I started off innocently enough thinking, "Well, this isn't too bad!" I looked down at my Garmin and it was giving me a pace that started with an 8. "Oh crap, better slow down or I will die," was my next thought.

The scenery through Heebner Park was awesome though. I had never been through the park since they created it when I was off at college. There are ball fields, soccer fields, tennis and basketball courts! I wish they had that there when I was a kid. Aren't we the up and coming township. The course started off nice and flat and I thought perhaps they were kidding when they announced that it was all uphill on the way back.

We jogged through Heebner Park and then down Heebner Road (for those of you not familiar with Worcester Twp, are you catching a theme?). We turned right at Hollow Rd, which has a surprising number of houses on it. When I graduated from high school it was an old gravel road. There was a large ladder truck stationed at the intersection of Hollow and Fawn Rd where we cruised around an orange road cone whose top looked like it caught the business end of a fire at once point. Then it was back uphill. I was pretty much jogging (and I use this term loosely) until the halfway point. My shins were hurting and my lungs were burning, which all means it's time to walk. I walked alllll the way back up Heebner Rd. and then jogged at spurts through the park. With just a few minutes until the finish end, the album I was listening to (The Donnas - Spend the Night) stopped. I didn't want to waste time finding a new one to listen to bc I was already at 40 min.

I crossed the chalk finish line at about 41:44 but couldn't get my watch to stop until 41:49. The "official" time was 41:50, but I wasn't at the head of the pack at the starting line. My Garmin said the course was 2.99 but I'm not sure how accurate that was. I bet if I had stuck to the right side of Heebner and Hollow I would have made it a little closer to 3.1. Everyone did a nice job though and they were surprised by their times so it was probably a short course. My goal was to get under 43 minutes, which is what I ran/walked it at the beginning of the week in St. Paul. Goal achieved!

Ru and I went home to a spectacular breakfast prepared by Master Chef Byron. I almost had two scones, but resisted. They were totally nom-worthy though.

I'm proud of the time that I ran because I really haven't had really any practice or exercise since I completely messed up my back in March. I really enjoyed this race because it was just me and Worcester (and the gnats, which were pretty bad, but worse if you had a visor on). There were only 99 people running, which made it pretty much a solitary event. There were no dogs' leashes to get tangled up in and no crazy women pushing strollers who just decide to stop in the middle of the course and walk. I very much prefer this type of race to the type of races that I've been participating in in Minnesota. Towards the end there were two gals in yellowy-green shirts that had been around me the whole time. And that was all. The gal in yellow totally took off for the last leg. I believe I beat the gal in yellowy-green since I started jogging the last little bit.

Now I'm looking forward to dinner with the fam to celebrate Mom's retirement. I forget what the restaurant is called, but there was a crab mac and cheese on the menu, which I will totally be ordering.