Moonlight Madness 5K

As you may have seen from my previous fitness post, I’m training for a half marathon in November! I’m really getting into the training now with my long runs in the double digits, and I start speed work soon (which I’m completely dreading, btw). I don’t know if I’ve ever run a race WHILE training for another race, but I saw this 5K as a fun social opportunity with friends and a great way to see what kind of pace I can run right now. After the race there were food trucks, live music, and beer; basically making for a really fun night. The weather started to get the idea that it should be fall and it was a beautiful night to run!

Sam and his coworkers created a team that they let me be on. (Thanks guys!) We ended up placing third as a team out of 43! Pretty darn good if I do say so myself. I was also really happy with my personal time; I just broke 21 minutes; averaging less than 7 minutes a mile. Not too shabby for being in “distance training mode” and putting the speed back for the first time in a while. I finished as the third place woman overall, with the other two women within 20 seconds of me. I’m not upset about being so close to the other women because that means I was running with the best of the women there. I never run 5K’s so I was really proud of how well I competed. (I also heard one of these women runs 5K’s EVERY. SINGLE. WEEKEND. yeah…)

I have no more races planned until the half marathon, though. I’m using this 5K as an assessment point to see what I want to focus on as I continue training. I obviously have a little more distance to put in, but I’m really not too far off the race distance right now because I ran 11 miles on Sunday. I DO know that I want to really challenge myself in terms of pace for the half marathon. I’ll update you as I start speed work and tactics I try to use on normal and distance runs to improve this aspect of my race. I’m super thankful for a fun night to run and looking forward to seeing how this improves my half marathon!

*ALSO, funny story from the race:

When I was being presented my award, the gentleman had to ask me if I was 21… (The prize included a large bottle of beer) Someday I’ll be thankful for looking young I guess!