The original plan for today was to do this race:

I did this race two years ago and remember enjoying it. It was a  small local race and and I loved the gloves (Unfortunately I lost them).  I have enough shirts and bags.

But this race was in Altamont (30-40 minutes away) and a little hilly so I noticed a new race advertised that took place at the Corning Preserve – where I like to do my long runs.  (It is closer and flatter) so I changed my mind at the last minute.

I knew nothing about this race besides that you get a tee shirt (yay!). Anyway it is a good way to run off that turkey and I could continue to tack more miles on after the race.

The race started at 10 am.  It was VERY COLD (the coldest morning yet) but at least it was less windy than on Thanksgiving day.

I dressed in layers again…this time with fleece lined tights and fleece lined gloves.

I didn’t get there early because  had a feeling that the race would not be crowded. So I parked in the parking lot and there were only a few cars..uh oh!! So I slowly ran the 1/2 mile to the start.

Yes, there was music, food, raffles and very few people.

As I do at every race, I quickly made friends with two runners.  One, Valerie was my age and has run all 35 Freihofer for Women races,  Her PR is 26:XX but she only runs several times a year and only 5Ks.  Another was in  her 40s and just ran her 2nd half marathon & finished under 2 hours.

We waited and waited.  And it was freezing.  Finally 2o minutes late, all of 15 of us started the race.

My plan for the race was to not go out fast and die like Thursday.  I also wanted to finish under 30 minutes and beat Valerie (how shallow).

So I lagged behind Valerie for the first mile, The 2nd mile, I caught up to her and ran behind her for the rest of the race until I saw the finish line.  Then I smoked her.  Yay me!

The three of us stood around waiting for awards.  I won 1st place in the 50+ age group. (there were actually at least 3 of us.)

We all won medals.  We joked that we should have formed a Team called the Old Lady Runners.

Valerie was the only one that brought money and won about 10  raffle prizes –  she really made out (one was a one month gym membership.)  She felt guilty and shared a few with me –  visit for 2 to a yoga studio and 2 tickets to Saratoga dance museum.

They had lots of food left so I had a egg & cheese sandwich and ran back to my car to change my shoes (I do my short runs in Mizuno Sayonaras and longer ones in Brooks Adrenalines), warm up and motivate myself to do 5 more miles.

I did it.  At first I was running into the wind and the sun went in and my face was freezing off and my hands went numb.  Then I turned around and it was bearable, even nice.

Of course, I had to turn around once more to get to my car and it was cold again.

As for the race.  It was not my best but I enjoyed it a lot.  I finished slower than Thursday with a time of 29:41 (according to my Garmin since there was no clock.) I finished under 30 minutes and all my splits were under 10 minutes (and mile 3 was faster than mile 2).

Splits:

mile 1- 9:29
mile 2 – 9:53
mile 3 – 9:49
.1 –          7:22

So as you can see, I still need to work on my speed.

The biggest news is that I got matched last night with a running buddy through I Run for Michael.  His name is JohnAnthony.  I am very excited (more about this in another post.)

This is what his mother posted in FB today:

Hey everyone! We are proud to announce that JohnAnthony got matched with a runner in the I run for Michael group! We are so exited. This is an awesome group that is there to match special kids/adults to a runner buddy. They encourage each other, pray for each other and the runner runs for the buddy. We got matched last night. Its an amazing group of amazing people who encourage each other. Lets face it we could all use some encouragement. Especially those of us on a special journey. And there are currently 1,7OO runners still waiting to get matched wit a super awesome buddy. Yall should definately do it. JohnAnthonys runner is Darlene in New York and she already ran a 5k this am and won a medal for JA! Woo Hoo!

Happy Running! Did you run off that turkey?