Stupid Little 10 miler

Yes, that really is the name for this race and not me venting. :) I LOVED THIS RACE!!

This is a small race about 30 miles west of me. I had never heard of it before, came across in an article online and thought, why not? My main goal race is the National Half Marathon this weekend, so I thought I would just go to this 10 miler and take it easy; have fun with it.

And it was fun. The race is held in a campground, along the Shenandoah River. The people there were so nice... runners and volunteers. Most of the time runners are nice, but it seemed extremely so at this race.

The race director said that IPODS would disqualify you. I had never seen such compliance with this rule. And I didn't even miss it. I actually think that this enhanced the race because runners were able to talk and encourage each other.

but let me back up to before the race started, the funniest thing happened in the porta potty line. I was talking to the girl in front of me. ( I like to talk, can you tell? ) And this man turned around and said very loudly, " I KNOW YOU!" " You were in front of me the whole time during the Reston 10 miler and I could never catch you. " " I'm going to be running with you."

I was like, Ok. ? I loved his boldness. So, Johnson (that's his name) and I chatted and started the race together. I kept it at a nice and easy pace for the first three miles. And after that, Johnson, dropped back a bit. The race course is out and back and even though I felt good, I kept holding back. We turned around at mile 5, of course, and then, finally at mile 8, I gave myself permission to pour it on. That was fun. I was able to pass people for the final 2 miles.

Final time was 1:31. So, the first half of the race was 46:00 and the second half was 44:00. Miles 7 -9 were in the 8:45 range and the last mile was 8:00 That shocked me. I think this means that I went out a little easy, don't you think?
But again, my goal race is this weekend, so I didn't want to "race" the whole thing. And passing people at the end is awesome.

I highly recommend this race if you ever find yourself in Berryville, Va. Afterwards, they had Krispy Kreme donuts and Coke. They gave out random awards ( the 32nd finisher) and funny trophies ( beauty queens and jockeys)