2011 Girl's On the Run 5K--Iowa City, IA

The race was local, so local that I had the bright idea that I wouldn't waste fuel to drive there or time to park, that I would run there, then do the race and then run home. I mapped out the location of where the race was and decided that 1.58 miles wasn't a long distance to run so I did just that. However I left my house later than expected and ended up having to sprint there almost to make it in time to line up for the race. When I arrived at the place where I thought we were starting the race, I remembered that the actual race was starting in the cross country fields a half mile away. So I then ran another half mile to the starting place. I was tired when I got there.

I saw my friend Rhoni Jo, but couldn't get a picture since I hadn't carried my camera on me. All I had on me was my cell phone (which does take pictures but I have yet to figure out how to get those pictures from the phone to my computer) and chap stick.

Rhoni Jo was awesome and ran with me the entire time of this race, right by my side and when I seemed to be struggling (and I was) she asked if I was okay and she even walked with me when I stopped to walk.

By mile 2 of the 5K race I was having trouble breathing and my body was saying, "Stop and take a nap." That's exactly what I wanted to do, but kept on running, however not very fast. About a half mile before the race was finished Rhoni Jo and I came around a corner of the cross country field and the wind hit us so hard it about knocked us out. It felt like the wind picked up by at least 20 m.p.h. I had to close my eyes so my contacts wouldn't blow out of my eyes. I really had a super hard time finishing this race. At about .10 left of the race I said to Rhoni Jo, just go, finish! I walked a tiny bit to regain my breathing control and then ran in to the finish. The time clock said 32: something and seriously it didn't even matter what the time was by this point because I felt lucky to even finish. This 5K cross country course (which by the way was 3.19 according to Rhoni Jo's GPS running watch) was the HARDEST 5K I have EVER ran. I really had a hard time. Maybe it was because I ran 2 miles before the race and ran those two miles faster than I should have, maybe it was the wind, or the cold or those massive hills on the course. I'm not sure what the factors were exactly that lead to this being so hard yesterday, but it was hard and I feel that much more awesome that I finished. My regret is that I didn't have my real camera to get a picture of Rhoni Jo and I before and after the race.

A picture of the shirt we received for the run.

My race number

This is the finishing medal, which was reserved for all the little girls that do this run.  However there were a ton extra left over and I asked if Rhoni Jo and I could have one and the race director seemed super fine with that.  It will be a nice addition to my racing scrapbook that will say on the page, "Hardest cross country 5K ever"