I am so. sore.
Yesterday I participated in the “Fit Challenge” at the Gilruth Center at work as part of a team that Debbie put together, and followed that up this morning with the Reindeer Run 5K. This race is one of my annual favorites, for many reasons. It’s five minutes from my apartment, and the course runs through my favorite neighborhood in the area, past both Clear Lake and another pond, and through a small park. The weather is always good (though today was one of the warmest that I can remember; I know last year was pretty cold), and it’s just a nice friendly neighborhood event. It draws 400-500 runners, including lots of kids thanks to tons of kid-friendly activities in addition to the Kid’s K like crafts, a small train, a petting zoo, and Santa.
I woke up this morning sore in some unusual places thanks to yesterday’s fit challenge. There were both individual and team activities, and on the individual front I ended up doing both the Strongest Woman competition and the Speed Aerobics competition. I had never done true bench presses before, and I had never done aerobics before, so I knew it’d be interesting at the least. In a truly bizarre twist, I ended up winning the strongest woman competition even though I never lift weights. The girls only had to bench press the bar without weights, but the bar itself weighed 45 pounds. I did 34 before my arms cried for mercy. There was only one other girl, and she did 32. I thought she was going to beat me soundly as she looked solid through about 28 reps, but she went downhill fast. Anyway, my arms are SO SORE today. Ouch.
Speed aerobics was also new. It involved a combination of stepping on and off a step (it was really step aerobics), kicks, knee raises, hamstring curls, and jumping jacks in various combinations to progressively faster music. I kept up ok, but sometimes got tripped up during the transitions from one step to another. Anyone who had done step aerobics before definitely had an advantage. This went on for half an hour, and by the end I was drenched in sweat, and today my calf muscles are quite sore.
After all that, I wasn’t sure how the Reindeer Run would go this morning, but I was happy enough with my result. I finished in 32:24 (10:27 pace), which was right about what I expected — however, it felt harder than I’d hoped. I started the race with Jason, Debbie, Melissa and Kelly, and while Jason and Debbie shot out ahead, I stayed with Melissa and Kelly for a while. We hit passed the mile 1 marker in 10:03 — too fast for me! I can’t maintain that pace for a whole 5K quite yet. We passed the mile 2 marker about 5 minutes later, so it was obvious that the sign was in the wrong spot (not to mention I’m very familiar with the course and know where mile 2 is). At that point I needed to catch my breath so I let them go ahead while I walked for about 30 seconds. That was probably a bad idea, because it led to walking a few other times before the finish. I passed the mile 3 marker with a half mile to go — another marker horribly misplaced. No matter, I knew how much was left.
I gave the last couple tenths all I had. When I turned the final corner my watch read 31:00 and I really wanted to finish under 33:00. Did that with 30 seconds to spare. With the mile marker inaccuracy, I didn’t get great splits. Mile 1 was 10:03, so math says that the remaining 2.1 miles were 22:21. I maintained close to 10:00 pace while running — I just couldn’t run that pace the whole way without a couple quick walk breaks. But I’m working on it.
Overall it was another good year at the Reindeer Run. I went back and looked at my Reindeer Run history, and it’s sort of all over the map.
2002 – 31:40 (my PR at the time)
2003 – 29:18 (PR that stands to this day)
2004 – 30:34 (won a trophy for 3rd in my age group!)
2005 – 32:45 (it was warm that year — about 75 degrees)
2006 – 35:00 (ran it with Jose)
2007 – 32:24
