Chase Race and PAWS

I suck at taking pictures, lol. Anyhoo, this is the hardware I came home with yesterday from a very cool race, the ChaseRace and PAWS. It's a 2 mile race that's also on the Grand Prix and has a 1 mile fun run with your pets afterwards.

Despite myself I managed to have a great time. I'm not sure what's going on but I've been having some excellent training runs but falling flat when it comes to the races. Don't get me wrong, I'm having some decent times but it's not what I should be doing. I thought I was doing a decent job of hiding my weird sucky mood but Annette noticed right off that I seemed, well, "off".

Back to the race--this is the first time I've ran a 2-miler and I'm not so sure I liked it. Line up and wait for the start then it's balls to the wall. This is not a distance where you pace yourself and I'm not a fast-twitch muscle type. Still working on my pacing for the longer distances but not fast enough for the super-short races, sigh. After the 1/2 I'm going to try and work on my speed a bit more but I also want to keep my long runs at the slightly higher mileage.

I didn't line up right at the front, learned my lesson from the elbowing at the Valentine's Day 5k but I wasn't quite in the middle either. I did manage to get lined up behind a small group of women that wanted to run 3-4 abreast and just could not get around them in the beginning. This was after the several speeches we got about not doing that before the race start. Guess I'm just not aggressive enough. Looking back it's kind of funny but it wasn't at the time. I'd go to the right and try to pass and got blocked, tried to squeeze between them (didn't work), move to the left, same thing.

Was feeling dehydrated so grabbed a water at the stop for one quick sip (just enough to wet my mouth and throat). Should not have needed it for that distance and the conditions but was miserable. Forgot to mention that I was having tummy troubles that morning, THREE trips to the bathroom, ugh.

Finish time was 15:11, a 7:36 per mile pace. Placed 25th (again) out of 202 females. Won my first ever Masters award--3rd place. It's the mantel clock pictured above. Didn't expect it at all, as a matter of fact I was standing there gabbing at someone while they were announcing the master's division so didn't hear them call my name. James had to nudge me and say "hey, that's you". Complete surprise. The clock, by the way is very nice, good heavy weight and even has an alarm feature.

Between the 2 mile and the 1 mile pet run I ran around the shopping area with Melisha (who placed 6th overall, I hope some of that speed will rub off on me, lol) for 1.3 miles then rushed back to change out my race numbers. Found out that Elsie was nipped by a huskie while I was gone. Prior to that she was acting all happy checking out the other dogs and letting them check her out. She just doesn't like her butt sniffed, she has no clue about proper doggie greeting behavior. After the nip she was very leery of all the other dogs, even the yorkies and chihuahas so we couldn't line up near the front for the 1 mile fun run. There were way too many people that were using the retractable leashes and letting their pets take it to the end so there were quite a few stumbles. Me and a little boy about tripped over each other because he couldn't properly control his dog on the leash--I think his parents should have been running with him.

Elsie was great once the run started, we had several people comment on how well and fast she was going. My baby can RUN for a little dog. We ended up being the 20th across the line and we got an extremely cute bulldog trophy for 5th place female with leashed pet. And the husky? Yeah, we smoked them, LOL!

Interesting sights during the fun run. 1) A llama--yes, you read that right, somebody brought a llama to the fun run. 2) A raccoon in a baby stroller, James was wondering how many drugs they had to give it so it would stay still during all the commotion 3)Service dogs, there was one pulling a little red wagon with puppies in it AND carrying a basket in its mouth for the entire mile. Sign on the wagon "Puppy Party Wagon", very, very adorable.

Unfortunately after the race, a couple of guys in my running club had an accident on a training ride. Both had road rash, Russ broke his arm and James broke a clavicle and at least one rib. Both were wearing helmets and Arland was riding with them (he's a fireman and trained for emergencies) thank goodness. Sorry guys, I know from personal experience how bad it sucks to have that happen.