white nøise

D and I completed another 5k this weekend, this one circling through the old neighborhoods of Covington. It was a much smaller event – less than a quarter of the runners in the Flying Pig 5k – but still a good turnout. Although the weather was perfect when we left the house, heavy rain moved in as we drove down. And it didn’t stop. We were all drenched before the starting gun, and endured steady to hard rain the entire race. By a mile and a half in my shoes were squishing and contacts sliding around. It was also a pretty hilly course, none of the grades were steep, but there were a lot of them.

Despite the conditions I still managed to knock a minute and a half off my Pig time. My first split was around 9:40 (which was great) and I had a fairly strong finish, but I’m still struggling in that middle mile. Did I mention it was pouring, though :) So, I didn’t make it under the half hour mark as planned, but that’ll be the goal next time out.

After drum corps kicked my butt into shape the summer after high school, I grew to enjoy running, and did so through most of college. It was great for stress relief, and cheap! I wasn’t super consistent about it, but I did run a few 5Ks over those years which I always had fun with.

I’ve wanted to get back to running for a while, but there was never quite enough push to keep me going past a couple times out. Between the wet springs and boiling summers we get, it’s quite a challenge to make a habit out of it. But with the news of Bob’s passing at the age of 38 and my own view of 39 (and then 40) creeping up I figured it was now or never. D and I signed up for the Flying Pig Marathon’s 5K event and it really gave me something to keep running toward.

After about 5 weeks or fairly regular walking, then running, the race was held downtown last Saturday. The weather wasn’t great, a bit of a drizzle, but at least the temps were cool. The first half mile was awesome – it was great to be running again (in an organized way), not to mention zooming past plenty of people at the start. Of course the next couple miles weren’t so easy, but D kept me going. I was really disappointed to see the first mile split tick to 13:00 as we passed by. Sure, a minute or two of that was just getting to the starting line (something the RFID shoe tags awesomely account for these days), but that’s still 4 or 5 minutes longer than splits in the old days. The last quarter mile was great though, with music, cheers, and people lining either side of the street I finished with a good kick. I definitely plan to make the Pig a regular a event and might even try a longer distance next year. For now, I’m looking for the next race to prepare for.

For my own record keeping here’s how I did: