Chasing Pavements

Activity: Run
Date: 03/07/09 07:01 AM
Distance: 9.51 miles
Time: 1:38:19
Speed: 5.8 mph
Pace: 10' 21 min/mile
Calories: 911

Saturday morning's run was the Sue Krenn 15K. This is a track club sponsored event, so there's usually a lot of veteran track club members, but there was a pretty good showing of non-members as well. Some of my favorite bloggers were there, such as AKA Alice and Anne. I haven't run with Anne since the Balboa Park 8 mile run two years ago, so it was nice to run with her for about the first 3 miles of the race and briefly catch up on happenings. I also met another running blogger, Laura, who I have probably met before, but she's been away from running for a while. I also saw several track club friends who didn't run but volunteered at the race. My husband even saw a work colleague who ran the race as well. It was a day of reunions. I'm kicking myself for not bringing a camera.

The start of the run was a little confusing. There was no audible horn or buzzer to indicate that the race had started, at least I didn't hear anything. Everyone just started running. I'm guessing someone yelled "go." I did well when we ran on Fiesta Island, which has an asphalt road. It's when we ran along the bay path at Mission Bay park that I had some issues. It's all concrete and my legs felt heavy, but I paced myself with a young lady who was slightly in front of me, just to keep going. My right shoe dug into my ankle with about 2 miles left to run. I was running on the slanted side of the walk-way, just so I could stay out of the way of the on-coming traffic of kids from another run event that was going on at the same time at the opposite end of Mission Bay park. Amazingly, the kid traffic didn't interfere with my time too much, as I kept an even pace while following the young lady in front of me.

Around mile 4 of the race I used my iPod. I think this is the first race where I've used an iPod. I normally like to be completely aware of all the sounds around me when I run outdoors, but at the 10k back in January I was really distracted with two miles to go and I just wanted the run to be over. Having music when I needed it gave me somewhat of a mental boost, especially when my legs felt heavy. I finished the race to "Handlebars" by the Flobots.

1:39 and change was the approximate time on the race clock when I finished, but my GPS gave me 1:38:19. Final results haven't been posted yet, so it will be interesting to see those results, since it's not a chipped run and we actually ran 9.5 miles, not 9.3 miles. Several people were comparing the distances on their Garmins and other GPS devices. I'm guessing my results will be in the 1:40:00 range, just because it always seems that official results are usually higher for a non-chipped event. Regardless of time, I completed yet another goal, and that was to just finish the race.

Post race we went to the High Dive for breakfast. I felt pretty good at breakfast, but by the time we got home my ankle was swollen where the shoe dug into my foot. I'm doing the R.I.C.E thing and took an analgesic. I'm hoping the ankle will be OK soon. It just feels bruised.

My husband was having some issues with cramping and blisters during the race. He finished near the end of the pack. He' s fine now, but I think it was mostly a matter of his day-before-the-race glasses of wine and food choices... He finished at around 2 hours.

I was hoping to have pictures and official results to add to this post, but neither have been posted yet.

Wednesday's song:
Hey Muscles I Love You - Muscles

PEACE

*****EDIT*****
489 IRENE M 1936 49 16/27 F San Diego 1:37:53 10:31