Race Report: 2012 Run for the Oaks

Lesley, Nancy, and Karen (part of the corporate team competition)

I completed C25K W1D3 with a 5K! I did the Run for the Oaks 5K in Raleigh, NC, and also competed in the corporate team challenge with a couple of Duke employees. I'd paid for the 5K a while back, but hadn't gotten motivated back then, so I decided to participate for the team (minimum of three) but walk most of this race to prevent injury.

Early on in the race, a policeman pulled up me and gave me course directions, urging me to the sidewalk. Thank goodness the print was big enough for me to see without my reading glasses, which I don't run with. For a chunk of the race, I was able to see the people in front of me, but at one point in the race, there were a number of neighborhood street turns. I missed one turn and overshot by a block. Another walker slightly behind me and I asked a man walking his dog, and got back on track. *sigh*

A little more than halfway through, I decided to start run/walk intervals of 30/120 seconds. There were times when I ran a little more. This wasn't my normal 60/90 run/walk for the C25K, but  the distance was longer than I'm accustomed to lately, so I took it easy with the intervals until the last push when the finish line was in sight.

When I got near the finish line, I couldn't see the clock, but I kept running anyway and finished. When they announced the corporate team standings, our team wasn't called, as I expected us to be, so I went back to the finish area, and found Jim, the man who owns the timing company that did the race. I asked about my time, and learned that the official timing had indeed stopped before I finished (a first for me!). He asked if I had a watch time; thank goodness I had my Garmin Forerunner on! It had recorded almost 3.3 miles (thanks to getting lost earlier in the raced), but I didn't mind at that point, as long as our team got credit! I showed Jim my Garmin time (which he wrote on his hand!). A few minutes later, he motioned Karen and me (Nancy had already left) to follow him, and he gave us the 2nd place team plaque! Yay! Okay, there were only two teams entered in the open women's division, but it's still fun getting the bling!

So, I finished 3.23 miles in 1:04:20 yesterday, last by a long shot. Having to find my own way on the course was a little stressful, but I had a lot of fun otherwise. I'm happy to have a beginning time in an official 5K race, as I begin running again. It's great motivation, really. I'm already looking at 5Ks down the road.

I took my new iPhone 4S with me, and loaded some new songs beforehand to help me through this race and training in the months ahead. I took some photos with the phone before and after the race, and they turned out pretty well! One thing I like about taking photos with the iPhone is the ease of adding them to Facebook and Flickr!

After the race, I decided to stop at Big Ed's for brunch, where I had a veggie omelet with grits. Yum!

To see all four of my photos from the 2012 Run for the Oaks, click here.