Rochester Flower City Challenge

As you may well have guessed, life is typically busy this time of year. I wake up at 5:00 to get ready for work. Out the door by 6:20. Go straight from work to track practice. Make it home by 6:00 on a good day.  Try to throw together some food for the kids. Leave some time for baths (sometimes). Put the boys to bed. Put myself to bed. REPEAT.

It's no wonder that the lead up to today's half marathon left me a bit nervous. If you notice, there isn't a 'time slot' for running in my daily schedule. This has been a bit problematic but I've begun to employ a new training technique "MIND OVER MATTER."  I'm not lighting the world on fire with any of my long runs, but I get them done on the weekend. I wouldn't advise this kind of training for anyone, but it has worked for me. 

My third half marathon of the year and I finally have some BLING. (thank god!)  The organizers of this inaugural half-marathon did a fantastic job with this event.  Jen and I parked close to the start, walked past the Dinosaur BBQ to reach the registration, picked up our timing chips, met our friends LimaRuss, Judi, Melissa, and made our way to the start line.  We were all so excited for this race because Russ's wife, Melissa, was running her first half marathon.... YAY!

The course was outstanding, truly.  I felt quite strong and posted some negative splits for the first 10 miles. We passed Susan B. Anthony's house, George Eastman's house, Highland Park, Mt. Hope Cemetery (soooo many hills), and then passed through the University of Rochester campus to make our way to the finish.  My last two miles were tough, I left it all on the track, for sure, but it felt nice.

At about mile 10, we were in the middle of the cemetery. It had occured to me that it took a sick sense of humor to take us through a cemetery - I kept saying "JUST PASSING THROUGH, NOT PLANNING ON STAYING."

Crossing the finish line in 2:15 was my goal and I nailed it.  I hope to post a 2:00 soon, but I know that I have to put more effort in my training. That will not happen until I free up some time in my schedule - so this is going to have to do for now.  Aside from some of my training runs for Paris, this is a PR for me. WOOT WOOT. 

The highlight of the day came when Melissa crossed the finish line in under 3 hours. She looked over to me just short of the finish line as screamed "THAT WAS AWESOME."  I love it!

I know that there will be more time to train in a few weeks, so I am going to keep registering for races. It's the only thing that keeps me running.

Final thought: when this race comes around next year - don't hesitate. REGISTER and run it. It's a great race. KUDOS to FleetFeet of Rochester for creating an awesome event.


(I'll post photos soon)