Wednesday, January 21, 2015

ABB 5K Houston Race Recap!


On Saturday, I ran the ABB 5K race in Houston, as part of the Houston Double.  Running this race plus either the half or full marathon the following day would earn me an additional medal, so of course I had to do it.  Actually, Cary was the one who discovered this, and she talked most of our JFR Crew into doing it.  She's kind of like the Tom Sawyer of our group...I wouldn't be surprised if we end up whitewashing her fence soon!

Front of the race shirt.

Anyway, as I wrote on Monday, we were up very early for this race since we had to drive to Houston (it's about an hour and a half away), plus we had to do packet pick up as well.  We waited for the race to start at Discovery Green Park, where (naturally) we had to take some pictures:
Julia, Brian, Cristy, Cary, me, and Jeff - Day 1 for the JFR Crew!
 Me and the sisters!
This is my "too impatient to wait in line for the official backdrop" pose - Julia was my accomplice in taking this picture.  

What's with the BEEF shirt, you might be wondering?  Well, as of 2015, I am now part of the Texas BEEF team...as a provisional member, or Beef Tip, as they call it.  I need to wear their official shirt to at least three races this year, and then next year, the BEEF team will partially reimburse race entry fees for any BEEF approved races that I do, from a 5K on up.  The shirt is pretty crazy and I'm not thrilled with the placement of the word BEEF across my bustline, but hey - it's only three races this year.  And maybe next year they'll have a new shirt design.

Anyway.  Somehow I thought there would be 600 people running this race, but it seemed like there were a lot more waiting around.  Imagine my surprise when the announcer said there were 6,000 people running it!  Oh.  Guess I missed a zero.

Jeff ran with Brian, Cary and Cristy, while Julia and I ran together.  We did 2:1 intervals, and although we said we were going to take it easy, we ended up feeling really good so we kind of went for it.  We finished in 40:57!  That was not the intention, but hey - sometimes running just feels great.  Our splits were really good:

Mile 1 - 12:06 (holy moly!)
Mile 2 - 13:13
Mile 3 - 12:47
Mile .25 - 2:51

Average pace:  12:35.  And I actually hit 39:XX on my Garmin at mile 3.1, which is a 5K - unfortunately, I wasn't at the finish line when that happened.  Julia and I had to run zig zags around a lot of people/kids/walkers, and we added to our mileage.  So even though I've had a goal of breaking 40 minutes for a 5K race, I'm not officially counting this as having done that.  I'll get it, and soon, I hope!

Coming in for the finish - photo thanks to CC

Finished and feeling exhilarated:
This is the first medal I've ever earned for doing a 5K.

After the race, we went to the food tent for bananas and muffins.  We were all pretty hungry at this point and scarfed everything down.  Then another group picture:
Julia, Cary, Brian, Jeff, me, and Cristy, with our first medals of the weekend!

CC wasn't registered to run this race, so she ended up being our sherpa:
This was the bag they gave us at packet pickup - it was crammed with our jackets and extras, and CC lugged it all around during the race for us!

I'm glad I did this race because it was a great way to ease into the whole Houston half marathon weekend experience.  Having such a good time running it was a sweet bonus.  I don't normally run 3 miles the day before a half marathon, so I don't know if, by doing this race, it affected me for the half - yes I hit a wall, but maybe that would have happened anyway?  Who can say for sure?  Any case, it was really fun.

After the race, we went back to our hotel rooms (hurray for super early check in!) and quickly changed into dry clothes, and then met up for second breakfast.  Hey, when you have been awake since 3:00 am, your hunger cues are a little messed up!  Cristy was craving breakfast tacos, so Cary found a place on Yelp and we had a little adventure walking to it...let's just say it wasn't in the best part of town, but it was hugely popular (long line out the door), and it was good.
CC posing by the giant lady at the restaurant.  I was jealous because she'd stopped at the Starbucks in the hotel lobby for coffee; I love coffee and ended up having none all weekend!  Something was wrong with that...

Because we did this race and the half marathon, we got an extra medal on Sunday:
Sweet!  After the race we were clanging around like Mr. T  with all of our medals.

This was a fun race; I'm planning on doing it again next year for sure.

18 comments:

  1. Okay here's a spicy comment for you: some men would consider it beef where the letters are on your shirt :) Just joking around here. It's not a pretty shirt but hey if they pay race fees for you next year, it's worth it.

    Looks like you had so much fun this weekend!
    If I do a race event I prefer a big one because I'm not the fastest runner and with a lot of participients there are always people that run at your pace. In a small race I'm usually one of the last and that's not always good for motiviation.

    Well done on both races, hope you enjoy your rest week because you totally deserved it.

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    1. Remind me to never wear this shirt in your country, LOL! ;)

      I loved the big races for your very reason - I was no where near last, plus there were lots of people around me all the time. :)

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  2. It was such a beautiful weekend for a race. I'm glad you had fun. My mom now wants to do the half next year. I almost feel out of my chair when she said that. I guess I better start praying for decent weather on Jan 17, 2016!

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    1. WOW - your mom has really gotten race fever! Sign her up before she changes her mind!

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  3. Woohoo for your first 5K medal ( and the additional one for doing both races). I had to chuckle about the Tom Sawyer comment as I taught 8th grade Language Arts for several years and tom sawyer was on our required reading list year after year! That beef tips is too funny. I guess it could be called something worse!

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    1. Tom Sawyer is a tough read with all the vernacular - I had to read it, but that's one I'm good with never rereading.

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  4. Okay, nice race report. But NO COFFEE ALL WEEKEND??? Has racing addled your brain? Do you have a doctor's appointment scheduled to check out this anomaly?

    I kind of like the BEEF shirt, now that I know the meaning of it. It looks like its nicely made, and has a good fit to it. And I like that one sleeve effect. Plus, MONEY! That makes everything look better, right?

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    1. I'm trying to drink lots of extra coffee this week to make up for the weekend, LOL!

      And yeah, the idea of getting a refund on part of my race fees makes wearing that crazy shirt worth it.

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  5. I am with Debby and the no coffee thing? That is totally incomprehensible to me LOL!

    Which did you like better, the 5K or the half this weekend?

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    1. Good question - I liked both races a lot. This was a great 5K, no doubt, but of course I have to go with the half marathon.

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  6. Hope there's a new design for next year's shirt!! Congrats on your 5K medal, Ms T. How could you have survived without coffee ....was that a planned thing?

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    1. Definitely did not plan on not having coffee - but the coffee at the breakfast taco place didn't look promising, and I don't drink coffee before I run, so none on Sunday, either.

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  7. OK, so I say yes the 5K affected your half marathon but whoooo care? If you had fun that's really all that matters. We are not professional racers here LOL.

    Also, the lack of coffee affected everything, I'm quire sure!

    So happy for you that it was such a wonderful weekend - no wonder you might reneg on your "no more halfs" announcement.

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    1. If I do another half, this would be the one. We'll see - I am definitely in for the 5K next year. I just don't want to even think about training, or training for seven freaking months, for a half.

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  8. Wow, that first mile was speedy! Great job and cool on double medals - you'll soon have to buy another medal hanger at home! :D

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    1. Nah, plenty of room left on the medal hanger. But it's filled out quite nicely! :)

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  9. Congrats on 2 great races, Shelley! Your enthusiasm is contagious. But not contagious enough to make me want to run. :)

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  10. These are awesome medals! Congrats! Keep going strong! :)

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