We have a tradition of running the New Year’s Day 5-Miler race at White Rock Lake (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013). This year was no exception, even though information about the race didn’t post until mid-December.
Maybe it’s a sign of my age, or just exhaustion from a week of guests and a late New Year’s Eve, but I managed to head to the race without my running watch and, more critically, without my runner’s bib. What a mess! Thankfully, they were willing to give me a new bib and we were set to run our sixth New Year’s Day run.
Not having any idea of my pace, progress in the race or (basically) anything at all, I set out at a relatively comfortable pace and hoped for the best.
The guys are significantly faster than me (I’m not bitter, I promise) and met me to run the last tenth of a mile. It’s a really helpful thing when you’re feeling tired and spent – not only do you have a pair of friendly faces who are happy to encourage you along, but it’s just nice to have a reason to keep running.
As it turns out, we all had a great run. Two of us had PRs and Kelly was 6/10ths of one second slower than his best time.
Even more fun – Kelly placed 3rd in his age group, John placed 4th in his age group and I placed 5th in my age group. Yay!!
