38:47.6

If I had a dollar for every time I told someone about this goal over the years I'd be a very rich woman.

Over the years, while sharing information about myself, such as my hobbies and interests, the fact that I wanted to complete a 5k race inevitably came up and every time I ended this part of the conversation the last thing I would say is, "I planned to do it soon." However, as I said above, I had the conversation many times which means I never really turned those words into actions.

That is until this year . . .

Earlier in the year as I was going through some e-mails I came upon one of the above mentioned conversations. Normally, I would have just ignored it and moved on with my day, but this time I looked at the date of the message - it was only a year old. As I looked at the words it dawned on me that I've been talking about this for many years now - and for some reason on this particular occasion that bothered me. That's when I decided this would be the year I would take action.

Sunday, just before 8 AM, I stood at the starting line waiting for the "Run For Her Life" race to begin, thinking to myself, "Wow, I'm really doing this!" Before I knew it, the race had started and I was on my way to completing my first 5k race experience.

During the first mile I spent a lot of time focusing on trying to pace myself and the fact that the rain wasn't letting up. I had been optimistic the rain would stop before we started the race, but that didn't prove to be the case. Actually, at one point we had a nice downpour. I had never run in increment weather conditions, so I was a bit concerned how it would affect my body and my overall run.

Even though I've trained consistently over the past couple months, I'm still in the process of building up my endurance, so throughout the run I found myself periodically walking. In high school, I had run track my freshman year. I was a sprinter. Running long distances was never my thing. This has been my weakness when it came to training for this race - learning to pace myself and build-up my endurance.

As I neared the first mile marker I couldn't help but look at the time. I really didn't want to because I kept telling myself that it was about completing the race, not how fast I completed the race. However, I looked - how could you not? It was right in front of me on a huge display. As I passed by the one mile marker, the clock display read: 11:00. Though anywhere from 10 - 12 minutes was par for the course during my practice runs, I was still impressed with myself. I grabbed a dixie cup full of water while trying not to slow-down fully and consumed it as quickly as I could. I felt bad throwing the cup on the ground like the others had, but I understood that's just what you do when running a race.

The second mile is where the course got more challenging. Prior to the race, S (who ran the race with me) and I diligently studied the course we would take during this race. (In theory it calmed our nerves.) This is when S pointed out that there was "elevation" along the way which in my mind meant slight, but not major, inclines. HA, was I wrong! Now, don't get me wrong, there were slight inclines, and then there were full-out hills. The path I had been taking for my training runs begins with a nice size incline, which I decided early on that I would run just to get practice running up inclines, however the hills we encountered Sunday made me feel as though I was back in Oregon and hadn't practiced on inclines at all. They were just too steep for my capabilities, so I found myself walking up them as quickly as possible. As one would imagine, this is where I began to lose even more time.

During the second mile, I thought a lot about my strategy for making up the time I lost walking up the hills. This basically equated to using gravity to my advantage when going down the hills. Walking up the hills took a lot out of my muscles and it was hard to start running again. By this point my muscles just didn't want to cooperate.

Also, by this point I began to see a pattern developing in my run/walk. There were about three of us that traveled most of the race together. The pattern started with me running in-between the two other individuals, and then I would stop to walk and would be passed by the individual who was behind me. After a few seconds of walking, I would once again start running and pass that same individual and take my place in the middle of the group.

As I passed the second mile mark, I once again glanced at the time. This time the clock read: 25:00.

Of all stages of this race, I'd have to say the last mile was the one where it wasn't only about my physical ability to finish the race, but it was about my mental ability to keep myself moving. Normally, all I have to do to keep myself motivated while running is play the song "Lose Yourself" and I'm good to go, but on this particular run that wasn't working.

During the third mile, I thought about my plans to participate in the Warrior Dash in 2012. I told myself a "warrior" would make it through a 5k without any problems.

As I neared the end of course I began to see a few individuals running towards me. They were familiar faces I had seen throughout the race and as I passed them I wanted to shout, "Hey, wrong way!" However, I refrained and went about the task at hand - finishing the race.

Just as I was made aware that I was entering into the home stretch of the course, the shuffle feature on my iPod started playing the song "Survivor" by Destiny's Child. Goose bumps took over my body because I realized this was the song I would be listening to when I crossed the finish line. Given the cause I was running for, Domestic Violence, and the meaning this song has in my life, I couldn't have chosen a better song to sum-up the day, the experience and all my personal thoughts and feelings associated with all these things. It was besherte.

As I turned my second to last corner I saw a crowd of people waiting at the end of the block. Even though the volume on my iPod was somewhat high, I could hear their cheering which only added to the adrenaline rush that had taken over my body. I could feel myself speeding up as I knew I was now only seconds away from completing my first 5k run.

As I crossed the finish line the display read: 39:01.

A volunteer met each runner at the end of the line with a bottle of water and heartfelt congratulations. As I took my bottle of water I began to cry a bit. The volunteer asked me if I was ok and I told her I was fine, there was no way I could explain to her exactly why I was crying.

I feel a little silly saying that I cried after completing the race, but the fact of the matter is that I did. Completing this race meant so much to me I really can't put the feelings into words. First and foremost, I had just achieved a goal I had talked about for 10 years. I wanted to write back to every individual I've shared this goal with over the past 10 years and tell them what I had achieved. Never again would I say, "one day" when I talked about running a 5k race. I was living a moment I had only dared to dream about for so long.

Additionally, my last two weeks of training had been challenging and my times not as strong as they had been early on in my training. Though I knew having a longer run time was ok, my competitive nature, and drive to push myself to do my very best, motivated me for a specific run time range. I was happy that I had finished with such a good time for me. Lastly, I was still thinking about the song I had just been listening to and the challenges that life has presented me over time. Not only have they made me a stronger person, I feel, they have made me a more caring and compassionate person ... and for that I am thankful.

Sunday evening, I went online to see if the official times had been posted. After locating the link to the race results I feverishly searched for my name as wanted to see my rank within the overall group and my age group as well.

As I scanned across this information, I noticed that my reported time was: 38:47.6.

"WHAT?" I thought to myself. Then it hit me that they have to technology to track when you cross the starting line so you are not penalized for being in the middle or back of the pak when the race begins. This made me feel even more proud of myself.

As I write this post, almost 40 hours later, I am still on a high from this experience. All I want to talk about is the race and I can't stop wondering when my next race will be. S suggested a race in December, however I have a conflict that day. Another friend of mine invited me to a race in November, but it's a 12 mile run with an obstacle course that makes the overall haul 18 - 20 miles. I politely passed on that invite stating I didn't feel prepared for the challenge. However, a part of me wonders if it's worth trying anyhow...

Before I sign off, I want to send some "thank yous" out to a few people:

To those who donated money to Family Shelter Service: In 2.5 days you raised $218 to help domestic violence victim reclaim their lives. I cannot begin to thank you for the amount of generosity you have shown.

To S and Ashley: Thank you for humoring me during the training process by accepting all the text messages I sent you regarding times, frustrations, etc. Y'all were great!

To all my family and friends: Thank you for your support and encouragement during this journey. Oh, and also for humoring me by commenting and liking my many, many, many Facebook statuses regarding my training progress.

To S: Thank you for asking if you could join me at this race after my friend I was originally going to do this with backed out. I couldn't have thought of a better person to share this experience with. Also, I know I said this Sunday, but again I will always find humor in the fact that when we first became friends getting up at the ass-crack of dawn to go buy yarn was so exciting for us and now what motivates us to get up at the ass-crack of dawn is to go run a race. How far we've come . . . I'm sure the amount of text messaging won't cease as we do have the Shamrock Shuffle in March and Fat Ass race in May to plan for!

Lastly, I want to say this experience has given me so much. It not only fulfilled a life goal of mine, it prompted me make healthier life choices than I have in the past.

This past April, I went to a wedding where I sat at a table of individual who participate in triathlons, and races similar to the race I ran on Sunday. At the time I was kind of bored listening to them talk about these things because I didn't understand their enthusiasm and didn't have anything to add to the conversation. However, now I get it. I have been bitten by this bug and I hope it's an infection that never wears off.

Until later . . .