Great American Smokeout 5K Color Run

Oh, my! I have had the best intentions of blogging more, but I just realized it's been more than two weeks since I've written anything...and I've missed it!

Earlier this week a friend of mine asked if I wanted to do a 5K Thursday. It was a benefit for the American Cancer Society and was scheduled to coincide with the Great American Smokeout. Her grandmother is battling lung cancer for the second time, and she wanted to honor her with the run. The two of us are already signed up for a 5K on Saturday with our city's City Lights downtown Christmas events, so I wasn't sure about running two races so close together. However, on Wednesday, I decided I'd do the race with her...on Thursday.

My sister was already planning on doing the race, but I was hesitant to sign up because it was a color run...I'm just not that into the color runs and mud races and such.

Yesterday after school as I was racing home to change and make it to registration in time, my friend called and said she wasn't going to be able to make it. Her grandmother's treatments were running late. I decided to go ahead and run anyway for her and her Gram...and I'm so glad I did!

The Before

 

My  sister picked me up and we made it just in time to get me registered for the race. It was 3 loops around a small lake (if you want to call it that). Each lap you made, we were told, you would be colored. Kind of a fun way to keep up with laps.

 

Carrie didn't have a voice, so we didn't talk as much as usual...which was just fine because we were running a lot faster than usual. I tried not to watch my Garmin too much, mainly watching the mile splits. Kind of cool to see an 8:20 on the first and an 8:24 on the second. I've never seen that! I ended up with a PR of 26:51, and the race was actually 3.25 miles. Average pace showed to be 8:15.

 

My parents had brought the kids, both my two and my sister's son, out to the race. There are duck and geese they fed, plus they got to see the color fun. They also took pictures, which I'll add later.

 

Here's the after:



 

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