Weekend rundown & Super 5K Race Recap

Happy end of Monday, all! Hope you had a great weekend!

Julia and I flew back from Florida on Saturday - and I was really bummed out to leave. 80 and sunny was beckoning me to just never leave. But alas, we needed to get back.

Sunday after my race I got Julia's pictures taken by my friend Bri - check out her blog HERE - she's a great graphic designer and photographer! Here are a few of the shots she got:

Love my sweet Julia!

We then went to my mother-in-law's for a Super Bowl party - only stayed until halftime though as both of us were tired from traveling and running around all day!

But the highlight of my day was the Super 5K race I ran in the morning!

I have done this race several times in the past and I always have a good time. This year they had 1,956 finishers which is I think the biggest one they've ever had. The weather was just about perfect - in the high 20s and it warmed up quickly as soon as the sun was up. I was pleasantly surprised to hear from my friend Stacy that morning that she decided last minute to sign up! So we met up before the race, sat in the warm car and just chatted for a bit. Stacy is also coming to Seattle to run the Rock 'n Roll half marathon in June!
Here we are at the start line:

I also ran into my Ironman coach, Roman, who gave me some last minute advice before the start: he said to be sure I didn't go out too hard, since my legs were like a brand new rubber band - they tend to snap when stretched too quickly and too hard! Duely noted!

I really had it in my head that I wanted to try and break 22 minutes. I had never done it before, as my PR was right around 22:14 or so. I wasn't sure if I could but I figured I would try.

I lined up around the 7:00 pace "line" and as soon as the gun went off, I was ready. I felt good at the start and luckily the crowd thinned out pretty quickly so I had space to get my pace in check quickly.

My other goal was to not look at my watch once. Roman told me to just run - it was the first race of the season, I just got back into town, no need to stress about it. There were also no mile markers on the course, so it did help me to just run and not worry about my time.

The course is decepitvely hilly - it is essentially an out and back and you don't really realize the hills at first. But after turning around, they become more obvious! I just kept up a pace that I felt comfortable with and tried to keep my breathing in check. Luckily I was feeling good but didn't feel like I was over doing things.

I rounded the corner for the last .1 and immediately saw the clock at the finish line. Holy crap, I thought to myself, that says 21 (and some change)! I sprinted as much as I could and finished with an official time of 21:26 - a 6:55 per mile pace (they just updated the results today!)  A PR for me by 45+ seconds! Needless to say, I was pretty geeked about that.

After grabbing a banana, I found my friend Matt (who finished in 17:16), watched Stacy finish in just over 31 minutes (a PR for her by more than 3 minutes - way to go!!) and then found Roman! He gave me some great words of encouragement and made me realize that my PR was by more than 15 seconds per mile - wow. Not too bad for my first race of the season!

We waited for the awards - Roman won the Master's division with a time of 17:28 (he's fast). I ended up getting 2nd my age group out of 155 women, and 126th overall out of 1,956! I won this fun stocking cap and all finishers got a pint glass - nice!

Overall a great morning and a "Super" fun race!

Questions:

1) How was your weekend?

2) Did you race? How did it go?

3) What is the coolest prize you've gotten at a race?