Jingle Bells 5K

Well the weather could not have been any worse (for the mid-atlantic). It was 42 and raining. But that didn't stop me and my mom from going out! It was hard to pick what to wear. I ended up wearing 4 layers on top, but only ran in two. Ended up running in a short sleeve under armor compression top and a long sleeve shirt with UA winter gear bottoms and running shorts. It was a little cold standing by the start, but after the first 5 minutes I was warm.




I was especially worried about my five fingers. After about the 5th step out of the car they were wet. It ended up not mattering much though. I splashed through puddles and didn't care. It kinda brought me back to an earlier childhood day when I tried to make the biggest splash with every puddle. Made the race more fun. At no point were my feet numb or even really cold.

When I hit the 1 mile marker I was at 8:05. I thought my eyes had deceived me. I tried to quickly figure out the treadmill mph equivalent, and I thought it was about 7.5 mph. I had only bumped it up to 8 once a week or so ago. And I felt like I was just warming up (well, except for my ankle, it was ready to be done!) I tried to keep up the pace. At mile 2 the clock was just turning to 16:00. Means that I upped it a little. Not bad! Sometime around the two mile mark someone behind me commented that my five fingers looked like water shoes. How fitting for the day!

As I was running down the long street that was leading up to the 3 mile mark I started to look down. It just seemed so far away. But I realized it and kept my head up. As I rounded the corner to the .2 mile home stretch I picked up the pace (much to the chagrin of my ankle). I sprinted into the finish and passed at 25:50.

I was thrilled. I thought I had run significantly better than a 30 on Thanksgiving, and this means that I definitely may have. Unfortunately the picture that Cara got has a guys head right in the way of the clock. After I stopped I realized how much my ankle was hurting. Instead of my Achilles though, it felt like it was in the right peroneus brevis and peroneus tertius tendon. I hobbled back to the car. It was all sooo worth it.