The Start
It was a chilly morning…I know it is nothing compared to
December-February but still it was around 40 degrees but a nasty wind made it
cold. The race was in St. Paul again. I’ve had enough St. Paul races to last me
a while. I’ve done three in a month. The start was downhill to Shepard road. I’m
really getting used to running on Shepard Rd. I’ve done many races on Shepard
road including last week’s Monster Dash. We ran down a ways, there were cars
coming at us…say what? Apparently they
only closed the one side and we ran down both sides. The volunteers eventually
got us all on the one side. But that just caused crowding and points were I
just had to walk because I couldn’t get around the walkers. There were a lot of
walkers! My first mile wasn’t bad, 11:15.
The Middle
So that hill I had so much fun
running down last weekend for Monster Dash…well I had to run up it this
weekend. Ugh. I hate hills. I guess it is preparing me for the Omaha Race in a
few weeks. I started to get momentum up the hill when we had our water stop and
first chocolate stop. Really? I think this would have been better near the top
of the hill but whatever. It was very crowded as people were taking pockets
full of mint chocolate (yum!) and water so it was another bottleneck. I learned from last week not to eat the
chocolate while running. I don’t want to have a repeat of that horrible feeling.
See I’m still learning. Mile 2 was very slow because of that, the pace was
around 11:32. Not great but it was mostly up hill and had that water stop. Once
we got to the top of the hill we hit the Wabasha Bridge across the Mississippi
River. This was new for me. I’ve never crossed the Mississippi in St.
Paul. The bridge was downhill the whole
way which was awesome
The Finish
At the bottom of the bridge we looped around on to Harriet Island. At
the entrance was the Caramel Chocolate stop…I love caramel! I grabbed a bunch
but kept going. I really struggled on the island. I’m not sure what my problem
was. I was tired and my pace was bad. I had my front pouch full of chocolate,
maybe that was weighing me down? I was
overheating because I dressed wrong. I know a lot of excuses but I was just not
feeling it today. I walked a little but kept moving forward. I was very happy
to see the finish. I didn’t even stop for the last chocolate stop, dark
chocolate, I just wanted to finish and get it over with. The race was short,
not quite a 5K so my time of 33:33 wasn’t really a PR but I’ll take it. (UPDATED: I mapped the route on Map My Run and it came out as 3.08 miles. So my watch must have lost connection under the bridge)
The Chocolate
There is such thing as too much chocolate. After we finished we headed
inside the pavilion for our share of the chocolate fountain. It was so
delicious. I dipped my bananas, Oreos, Nila wafers, animal crackers, pretzels….everything
in it. I wasn’t feeling so hot on the walk back to the car…I really ate too
much.
Maps, graphs and pictures:
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