I LOVED running my first 10K!! I was surprised I loved it as much as I did. When Phoenix marathon race started a few years ago and runs right through Mesa near our house I've wanted to do it but they only have a 10K, Half, and Full so I knew I needed to train more than I am willing to train when I am pregnant or nursing and then my running buddies both had a baby pretty soon after Miles was older.
When my friend Sunny, who is as cheerful as her name suggests, wanted to train for it I was thrilled. We both had sick kids and kids sleeping badly and we stay up too late and get up too early, but we did it! Sunny said if we're going to be sleep deprived anyway we might as well get our running in too! January we ran 26.15 miles mostly Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 5:45 increasing our distance by .5 mile each week. February we tried to start upping our pace which is harder than distance in my book. We ran 46 miles in February and ran the race the last Saturday of the month. We trained at about a 10 min mile.
At the start line
I got up at 3:45 or something crazy so we would have time to park and ride the bus to the start line by 6:30. I hydrated a little too much and we were in line for the bathroom right before it started but I didn't want to wait anymore so I just ran it and went pee after! I was very confidant we could run the whole thing I wanted to get under an hour or a 10 min pace. I was so proud of my 9:17 pace and 57:19 time, I was 16 our of 91 for my division! Sunny was awesome, she stuck with me for most of the race but I could tell she had more in her so I told her she needed to sprint the last stretch and she came in 12th I think in our division.
I loved the training and getting to exercise and have a therapy session with my good friend again. It was a little cold/dark but it made us be more consistent to have a race to train for. They started something new this year where each medal with have a different of the Arizona 5 Cs on it each year. This year was copper, next year will be cattle, then citrus, climate, cotton. When you put all 5 together they will make a star. I totally want them, this is one I want to run every year if I can. I love that it's close to my house, all my training can happen in the winter when it's not hot here and they run a great race with cool stations at each mile and an awesome finish line. They had Kneaders french toast, Dave's BBQ and all kinds of other free stuff.
Sunny wants to do the half marathon next year. I'm still not convinced I want to double my distance and training time. I'm still impressed we did the 10K!
Awesome feeling at the finish!
Erin Whitmer
- bib number:
- 1571
- overall place:
- 292
- division:
- F 30-34
- division place:
- 16 out of 91
- gender place:
- 110 out of 810
- clock time:
- 57:57
- net time:
- 57:19
- pace:
- 9:15 (based on net time)
We made a sign for Matt winning a contest at work the day before, they turned the dad paper over and changed it to mom for me!
