This is Matt. Today, I ran in my first 5K. The race was run at Tribble Mill Park in Grayson. It was called the 5-Alarm 5K and was run to benefit the Gwinnett County Fire Department Benevolent Association. I had been wanting to run a 5K for awhile and this sounded like a good one to start with in terms of the course description. Also, Fire/Rescue is a cause that is near and dear to our hearts.
I had heard about the race last week and told Julia about it. She heavily encouraged me to register for it, so I did. In order to get over the "mental" portion of it, last Sunday (7/8), I went to the gym with Julia and did the distance on a treadmill. For those of you who may not know, a 5K is 3.1 miles. Last Sunday, I did the distance in 38:41. This was doing a combination of slow-running and fast-walking. The couple of days after the "dry run", my right knee bothered me a little and the muscles in my legs were definitely sore. For several months, I have been going to the fitness center at the CDC a few mornings a week, walking on the treadmills there. In my
walks there, I had been doing an average of 1.5 miles at a time. I had really not been doing any running, however. I was typically going at a 4mph pace on the treadmill.
This past week, I went to the fitness center on Wednesday and Thursday mornings, and just did some light walking/running, mostly to try to work out any soreness or kinks before this morning. I came to the conclusion that my primary goal for this was to finish and not come in last.
Well, this morning, we got up at 5:45 and arrived at the park around 7:30, with Penny. It was really great conditions for the run. The skies were overcast, and it looked like rain. I got signed in and ran into James Mason, an old friend of mine from Gwinnett Fire, who I later introduced Julia to.
The start point for the race was marked by Gwinnett Engine 8 (out of Grayson), and Gwinnett Truck 12 (out of Snellville). In a nice touch of patriotism, a huge American flag was suspended from the extended aerial of Truck 12. The participants gathered by the apparati, and shortly after 8:30, both trucks hit their sirens, signaling the start of the race.
The course itself was along a paved path, around a large lake and in and out of the woods. The first mile was the toughest portion, in that it was quite hilly. I quickly formulated a strategy, which was to run the downhill and flat portions of the course and fast-walk the uphill portions. Along the way, I befriended another participant who was at approximately the same level I was. He's in the top picture with me. It felt like it took forever to get to the 1 mile marker. After that, the mile 2 marker felt like it came along a bit quicker. A good portion of the 3rd mile was rather flat, but by that point, we were fairly tired. On the approach to the finish line, FF Doug Kalmbach (24-B) was standing by the side of the path. He let me know that it appeared I would finish in under 37 minutes and high-fived me. This was energizing and pushed me to pick up the pace a little bit. As I crossed the finish line, I grabbed my time card to fill out from a race worker. My final time was 36:44, which I was very pleased with. I met both my goals and will definitely do more 5Ks in the future. I am also considering attempting next year's Peachtree Road Race, which is a 10K (6.2 miles). We'll see if that actually happens.
It was a great experience and something I enjoyed getting to share with Julia and Penny.
Mom and her Chi's. The Children are getting exhausted from picture taking... "enough already, let's open presents!"
Sierra can hardly wait to open her gifts of Vitamin "B" (dog bacon) and noise maker toys!! "Let's open presents N.O.W.!!"
"We shouldn't have let Sierra eat the entire bag!!"
