A quick Race Report for a quick race I did on Saturday...

I made a Friday evening decision that I was going to run this race.  I haven't been getting all of my weekly runs in and I always feel like doing a 5k gives me a little extra motivation to get my training together.  Also, if I'm being perfectly honest, another reason I chose this race is because it did not appear to be well advertised (I found it on an online community "things to do this weekend" list)...I like these smaller races because I have a good chance of bringing home an age group award and some shwag.

I showed up at 8:30 for "day of" registration.  I was given a number and a turn by turn sheet of the course.  At the top it read "This is a trail race and your times will be much slower than a regular 5k".  Excellent!  I had no idea it was going to be on trails!  I put on my trail shoes and familiarized myself with the start/finish and the first turn into the woods.

Everyone lined up at 9:00 and the RD gave some basic turn by turn instructions.  The start was a mess.  There was a guy with a jogging stroller lined up at the line with a ton of little kids around him.  I found myself a spot a couple rows back on the outside.  After the first 50 yards, everything opened up a bit and I found myself running behind a group of kids who were sprinting.  I located an adult who looked like he knew what he was doing out in front.  I tried to hang on to him as we circled the parking lot and as we entered the woods, I was about 30 yards behind him in second place.

The first mile I spent trying to keep 1st place from running away from me.  I knew that if the pace kept on I wasn't going to catch him.  It is a frustrating thing to be sitting in second place knowing that you can't catch the guy in front of you.  As we neared the first turn around (run to the puddle then turn around) 1st place magically started "coming back to me".  As he fell off the pace, I made the pass and we exchanged pleasantries.  After the turn around I took stock of who was still chasing.  Both 3rd and 4th places looked strong and I still hadn't really dropped 2nd place.  Running out front in this race meant I was in charge of navigating the course, which wasn't the easiest thing.  After making the turn for the 2nd out and back section (kind of a y shaped course) I saw that I had pulled some distance on 2,3, & 4 and I just needed to hang on for the last mile.  I throttled back a little bit in order to rest up incase anyone made a move.  Nobody did.  I ended up crossing the line for the win!  22:20 ish was my final time.

I hung around after and met a nice fellow who had also run the North Face Bear Mountain race a couple of weeks ago.  I was announced as the winner and given a nice little bundle of goodies, the highlight was a $50 Lowes gift card.  Certainly worth getting out of bed!

I guess you could say it pays to find these small races. Nice prize. That works out to about $134/hour, not a bad wage.

Congrats on the win, that's a first for you, right?

I won a 10 miler earlier this year, which was my first...it's weird to win a race, because I feel like for me it's more about who shows up than my actual running performance...either way, I'll take it.

Nice job.  A win's a win, doesn't matter who is there since you beat all those who showed up.  Good thing you had trail shoes with you since the running surface was a surprise to you.