Detailed Commentary Report is below.

Photos Slideshow:

https://s166.photobucket.com/user/scottydog69/slideshow/2019%2520Race%2520Reports/2019%2520Race%252053%2520Head%2520for%2520the%2520Cure%25205K?sort=2

BEFORE MY START

My 53^rd race of 2019 was Head For The Cure 5K on Sep 28^th, an even that supports raising funds for brain cancer research. This was the 6^th year for this event, which was started by local ABC news affiliate KSAT-13 after its news director died if brain cancer.  This is one of my ‘streak’ races, I have done this event every year since it started.  This was also my first race since having my pacemaker implant that I was cleared to go back to normal – normal for my anyway – and do my run/walk method, so I got to run in this one.  Race start time of 8 am., with location at Providence High School near downtown San Antonio.  This has become quite a popular event and there was around 900 runner-and-walker participants.

With my wife before the start

ON THE COURSE

Starting from in front of the high school, the course took us out onto St. Mary’s Street, where we went about ¼ of a mile, made a left turn, proceeded about a half mile down this street; another left turn onto a street that took us back to St. Mary’s;  that took us to a turn-round point just a bit past the high school, and then we headed back to the finish the way we had come out.  This is a VERY flat course, with the exception of some road camber in places along the way, but the total elevation for this course, I think, is about 6 inches, lol.  Pretty good course for folks who want to try and set a PR.  Me, I just wanted to take it easy and be able to do my run/walk thing the whole way.  I met that goal, finishing in 37:01 chip time, although just past Mile 2, I did take a 4-minute walk break instead of 2 minutes, as this was my first “run” race back and I was feeling it a bit by that point. I ended up 4^th in my age group out of 26 in my age group, some of whom were probably walkers as there was no distinction between walkers and runners in the age group categories.  I was pretty happy my results for my first run/walk race since my Aug 22^nd surgery.   My wife walked this one and, being a pretty speedy walker, was not that far behind me, finishing in 42 minutes. My speedy friend Bill, whom I walked with at a race last week, finished almost right behind me at 39 minutes.

After My Finish

Nice after-party with medals for all finishers; lots of food that included breakfast tacos, a variety of bagels, fruits, nutrition bars, juices, iced-down bottles of water, and much more.  There were also many sponsors there doing their thing, including a group called InBody that gave you an assessment of body fat and body mass index – which I did not do since I did not want to break their machine – and also blood pressure, which I did do, since my doc told me to monitor myself and keep a log of my BP and my heart rate at various times.  Mine was 100/80 which I though was a bit low for me; Gail’s was 105/71 which is normal for her, as she is the healthy one in the family, always eating much more healthy than I usually do.  As usual, wandered around taking photos and interacting with friends and fellow participants, and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

EPILOGUE

As noted, have done this one ever since it started and will continue to do it whenever I can. Really nicely organized event with a great course, and great after-party – well, except for no post-race beer -   😉 – but I get it, it is a public school, so probably not good to have beer on school grounds.  I certainly would recommend this one to others.

Mucho thanks to all the people that made this one happen for us: the founders, KSAT-12, and all the organizers, volunteers, sponsors, our timers, law enforcement and EMT folks out there for us, and anyone else I may not have mentioned here. Thanks for what all of you do to give we participants this event.