The Beautiful Letdown

A breastfeeding blog that dabbles in tandem, extended nursing, gentle parenting and much more

5K">My First 5K

May11

On Sat­ur­day, I ran a 5k race.  Orig­i­nally, I had planned (or hoped to plan) to run the half marathon with Jason.  As time passed, it became evi­dent that was not going to hap­pen.  Between me miss­ing run­ning days to meet other com­mit­ments, get­ting sick, find­ing out I had asthma, and feel­ing all around frus­trated, I just couldn’t do it.  I stopped run­ning alto­gether at the end of Octo­ber after a par­tic­u­larly nasty cold.  Then, I decided to pick it back up in Feb­ru­ary, and things were going alright until another nasty cold which left me unable to do any train­ing for about 2 weeks.  Even though I knew I wouldn’t make my goal, I decided to par­tic­i­pate anyway.

The morn­ing was cold and a lit­tle chaotic as no one around me really seemed to know what was going on.  As I got closer to the start­ing line, I felt more and more ner­vous.  I started off run­ning pretty well.  Then, I sort of just crashed.  I couldn’t breathe well.  I am not sure if it was from the cold air or the nerves or a com­bi­na­tion of both, but after about the first 3/4 of a mile, I felt pretty bad for the rest of the race.  I ran/walked, and I was able to run the last kilo­me­ter or so and fin­ish at a run­ning pace, but I really wasn’t all that happy with my inagural run­ning experience.

I placed 2800 out of 4500 par­tic­i­pants.  I was 329 out of 487 in my divi­sion.  I was 1775 out of 3117 for women.  My gun time was 48:01, and my actual time was 41:00.  My pace was 13:12 per mile.  I am not overly excited about this, but I guess every­one starts some­where, right?

posted under Running
5 Comments to

“My First 5K”

  1. On May 11th, 2009 at 9:12 pm Shannon Says:

    Still much bet­ter than I could do! I envy run­ners. I often wish my knees would han­dle running.

  2. On May 12th, 2009 at 8:13 am Andi Says:

    But you know what? You went out there, and you did it! You stuck to it, and you fin­ished your goal! I think that’s amazing.

  3. On May 12th, 2009 at 7:27 pm Mom On The Go Says:

    On the first day with your first baby, you don’t nurse a tod­dler but if you don’t nurse that first day, week, month, you almost never nurse a tod­dler. I think of run­ning a 5K to be the same. You took the first steps and maybe you’ll do more in the future but for now, be proud of the first race. Now I need to get off my duff and start run­ning again.

    It’s good to hear what’s new with you.

  4. On May 14th, 2009 at 1:35 pm Erin Says:

    That is great! I have only ran one 5k, a few years ago. It was a local race, put on by the park dis­trict. I thought, “great — there should be lots of run­ners of all abil­i­ties there, so at least I won’t come in last.”

    We got there (my hus­band was run­ning with me) and it became very clear that there weren’t a lot of casual run­ners at this race. It was mostly the col­lege cross-country team that showed up.

    Long story short, I didn’t come in last. My hus­band did. He MADE me cross the fin­ish line before him so that I could never say I was last. :) I still had fun and am glad I did it, and really want to be ready to do another one!

    Any­way, great job!! I hope your shins are feel­ing bet­ter — we have the whole sum­mer ahead of us to keep work­ing at this run­ning thing. Have you con­sid­ered the Twin-Cities 10-mile race?

  5. On July 29th, 2009 at 11:55 am Leslie Says:

    Good for you and great job! I ran my first 5K in May. I have my sec­ond one this week­end, which prob­a­bly wasn’t the best plan con­sid­er­ing I am STILL recov­er­ing from BlogHer. It was great meet­ing you there!