Midnight Madness
5 Jan
Happy new year everyone!
I want to start this post by saying thanks again to everyone who commented on my medal hangers. I was honestly surprised by all the positive comments. Perhaps an Etsy store is in my future! I will keep you all updated if I do get it set up.
Well I was back at work today after a week an a half off. It was soooooo nice to have some time off. I don’t get to take much time off during the year since I work for a small company. It’s been a full year since I’ve taken more than two consecutive vacation days so 10 days off felt like HEAVEN. M and I met up several times to run, and it was so great not to have to run in the dark.
On New Year’s Eve I hiked up Camelback with M and her husband. It’s about a 1.5 mile trail and a 1,200 elevation gain. Camelback Mountain is an urban mountain in the middle of the city. It’s a pretty popular hiking spot, and its considered extremely strenuous. There are many portions of the trail that it feels like you are rock climbing. I do this trail a few times a year and it always kicks my butt.
We decided to go up the longer trail on the east side of the mountain and come back down on another trail on the northwest side and then walk a few miles on the street at the bottom to get back to our car. We made good time, finishing in about 2.5 hours including a short break at the top. I was surprised how easy it felt. I’m in better than average shape right now and I could tell. That was very encouraging.
On the way down the mountain I mentioned to M that I heard there was a Midnight Madness 5k going on that night (New Years Eve). I was joking when I said we should do it. I was totally surprised when she suggested that we really should do it since neither of us had any exciting plans for the evening. Her husband even got on board offered to drive us. How could I say no!?
We looked up the race on Active.com when we got back and as it turned out the run was not really at midnight, it was at 10:30, which made it even better. We debated doing a “resolution run” in the morning instead, but we decided that it would be harder to get up in the morning than trying to run late at night. We didn’t know what to expect when as we drove to the race site about 45 minutes away. We were pleasantly surprised to find that the race had a good turn out and seemed well organized. A dj was set up playing music and getting the crowd excited and the the friendly volunteers made registration easy. We got these strange timing chips that had to be strapped around our ankles. Weird, but regardless I was really surprised that the race was chip timed. It’s the first 5k I’ve ever run that was.
I wasn’t really expecting to run fast because my legs had taken a serious beating in the last week. It had been just four days since my 22 miler on Saturday, then Monday and Tuesday I covered another 14 miles. Also, I had hiked 5 miles, up and down 1,200 feet only a few hours before the race. Then there was the fact that we were running at 10:30 at night and the two pieces of pepperoni pizza at 8:15 pm (not exactly the ideal pre-race meal!).
About 10 minutes before the race, M convinced me to race it with her. I had no idea what to expect of myself. Strangely, I felt pretty good, so why not go with it?
The funny thing about this picture is how bundled up everyone looks. It was just under 60 degrees at the time. Arizona runners are wimps. Count me as one of them!
The gun went off and we were off to a very fast start. I was behind M, just trying to keep up with her. I looked down at my Garmin after about 20 seconds and I saw something I have never seen. A pace of 6:51! Yikes! I didn’t even think it was possible for me to get into a 6:xx pace. It was short lived though and we settled into something around 7:30. I let M lead the pace even though it felt too fast. I was worried I’d have to drop off in the last mile. We couldn’t even talk we were running so hard.
When the second mile marker came M grunted that I should go ahead. I said no, this was as fast as I could go. But then she started to slow, and we got farther and farther apart. The last half mile I found myself passing people and they were all guys! I realized I must really be running fast with no girls in sight! It was tough, but I knew I was in a place to PR so I pushed and gave it all I had.
I crossed the finish line at 22:51! That is 1:15 faster than my 5k PR that I set on Thanksgiving! I was so excited! I realized a little later that the race was 3 miles and not a 5k, so I have to factor that into my time. But still, the average pace was 7:37 while my 5k pr average pace was 7:47, so I still would have beaten my time had I run another 0.1 miles.
M came in just 30 seconds behind me. She ended up winning her age group! Go M!!! I was 5th in mine. I guess all the fast girls were 25-29 years old.
After the race they served chile and cornbread. We hung around for a bit until it got cold and then took off. We ended up celebrating the new year at midnight in the car ride on the way home. I was very impressed with the entire race. M and I plan to be back next year and maybe get a group of people together to do it with us. We had so much fun. Well except for when we wanted to throw up at about mile 2!
Now I’m trying to taper and get these legs feeling fresh again. Less than 2 weeks now!!
