Bird Lover's 10k

As I had mentioned earlier I ran in the Bird Lover's 10k the day before volunteering for the Austin Marathon. This run was particularly tough as I had been sick for the last week and did not feel particularly well the morning of the race.

I ran as well as I could and was able to eek out a 10k PR. This race was different than the others that I ran as it was primarily on trails that had ruts and holes that you had to be careful of.

I finished in 54:01 for a pace of 8:41 min/mile. I think this is really good due to the illness and the fact that it was on a trail. This time was also good enough to get a 3rd place award in my age group!!!! YEAH!!!

As some of you know when I ran my first 10k race I had to purchase a trophy. In less than a year of running I had won my first award. Now don't be too impressed as I think that I have found out the magic formula for winning awards. The key is to look for the least popular race of the 4 races being held the same weekend as a big nearby marathon!!!! Do this and you too will be able to win an award!!!

The awards were definitely unique as it was a dream catcher. I think this was a neat award and it is much better than a trophy.

Below are a couple of pictures from the race.

May the force be with you!!!

This Weekends Events

As I had previously posted this last weekend I ran in a 10k race on Saturday and then volunteered at the Austin Marathon.

The Bird Lovers 10k:
This is the first time that I have run this race. It is a trail race that is located in a bird sanctuary in south San Antonio. The race was pretty tough. I went out too fast in the begining and definitely paid for it later. The course was made up of uneven terrain with holes and ruts. You defintely had to be careful of your footing. In additional I was still feeling the effects of the GI issues that had started on Tuesday, but the back pain from the prior weekend was gone. Despite all of the issues I finished the race in 54:01, which was good enough for a PR and a third place finish for my age group!!! The key to winning races is to run the ones that do not have a lot of participation. This particular weekend there were 4 other races going on that most likely drew away the other people.

The Austin Marathon:
At the Austin Marathon I first worked in food distribution and primarily prepared and handed out bananas to the runners. They ran out of bananas after a couple of hours so there were none left for the marathoners that finish in more than four hours or so. I then moved to handing out the medals as the marathoners crossed the finishline. This was a pretty neat experience to see how the people react when they cross they finishline. There was everything from the runners that kept on running (I thought this was kind of wierd) to the runners that were excited to cross to the runners that fought, limped, hobbled to cross the finishline. Several people needed medical attention as they crossed a couple of people puked shortly after crossing the finishline. I saw several runner that day that had blood on their shirts in the nipple area. I surely felt for them and could not imagine having these issues from running the marathon. I am sure that this is much more painful than I have experienced from the shorter races. Fortunatly for me I have found that Band-Aids were extremely well for me and I have not had any issues with this since using Band-Aids on my long runns. I ended up only handing out medals for a couple of hours as they had lots of help and I was still not feeling from the GI issues that I had been having.

May the force be with you!!!

Austin Marathon

This weekend is the Austin Marathon and I have decided to participate. Yes that is right another marathon.

I am sure that your saying "Yeah Right" - You just started running like 8 months ago and ran in your first marathon 3 months ago and Austin is a tough course with lots of hills. There is no way - what is the catch.

Well there is a catch. Note that I used the word participate. I will be volunteering for the Austin Marathon. I am scheduled to help with food distribution and handing out medals. This should be fun and it will let me give back to the running community. On Saturday, I am planning on running in a local 10k race at a bird sanctuary.

Chad

Civic Duty

I am going to try and start writing shorter posts more often about the goings on around here as I tend to want to only write when I have more to write about.

I fulfilled my civic duty today at least for the next three years as I served on a jury. The case was a DWI and it was all pretty interesting. We ended up sending her up the river!!! Actually her sentence was pretty light. She has to be on probation for 6 months and take a couple of classes. There is no fine and no loss of license. I guess she was a school teacher and she could lose her job because of the conviction.

Talk to you soon.

Chad

Feeling Good - while running

I went out for my run on Tuesday night and for the first time in a long time I felt really good from the beginning. Lately when I had been running I have been tight or stiff feeling for the first couple of miles and somewhere along the way I would loosen up a little and feel good for part of the run. It was nice to have a good run from the beginning.

I ran 6 miles this night and finished in 49:56 which is ggod for an 8:19min/mile pace. This is still amazing to me as when I started last June I was running at like 12 min/mile.

At least I am still progressing and that provides some powerful motivation.

May the Force be with You!!!.

Chad

Better than I Deserve

Last weekend Jill and I went to see the Total Money Makeover live event. We both had a good time. The event was 5 hours and was a little long, but Dave did a good job speaking. Jill actually enjoyed the event, which is impessive since it had to do with finances.

Dave has a lot of good concepts that would put people in much better personal situations if they were to follow his advice. I can't quite get behind everything that he says. I really like his idea about paying cash for cars and is the way I plan to go in the future.

May the Force be with You!!!

Chad