The Life of a Running Momma: Get Busy Livin 5k

We've done the Get Busy Livin 5k every year. This year it fell 12 days after the Boston Marathon. I figured I may just run it with my dad, but I hated not to be able to race it. I've won the race every year I wasn't either pregnant or had just had a baby. I was at 5 wins with 4 wins in a row going into this year. The year in between the wins I ran the race 3 weeks after Elise was born. As race day grew closer and my legs started coming around more and more, I decided to run some strides and test out what my body thought of some faster running. The strides felt weird and somewhat difficult and then my hips were achy the following day. I went back and forth and finally decided to go for it. My plan was to go out at 7:00 for the first mile. If that gave me a shot at winning, I'd run as fast as I could the rest of the race to do so. I was hopeful this year would be less competitive than past years. All my wins had been under 21 minutes and most were under 20 minutes. There was a year I ran 19:45 and 2nd place was 19:58. I thought 7:00 pace was doable, but anything faster than that would be a stretch. I told myself if I could run 6:54 pace for a 5k just 4 days after a half-marathon, I could probably do something similar 12 days after a marathon. It seemed to make sense, but after running this race, I must say the way my body felt 12 days after a marathon was completely different than how my body felt 4 days after a half-marathon.

I ran from my parents' house to the race start as my warm up. I was running 9:30 pace and not feeling great which didn't give me much confidence for how the race was going to go, but I figured I just needed more time to warm up because my body was worn out. I saw Thomas and walked over to him. The race announcer was speaking and I couldn't hear him from where we were standing, so I headed over to the start area and stood with Jeremy. The announcer told us he was going to count up to 9 since Dylan's, who the race is in honor of, football number was 9. Then he said, "3, 6, 9." Since that isn't typically how you would count I thought he was doing it to show how he planned to count. Everyone just stood there for a while and he walked off so we all realized that was the start of the race and we took off. He started the race 4 minutes early so Thomas wasn't at the start yet. As I ran past Ty he told me Thomas had missed the start. I was surprised that the race went out really slowly. I didn't want to take off fast, so that worked out great for me. There was one woman ahead of me leaving the football field and I passed her pretty much right away. Then there were just a few high school looking boys ahead of me. As we crossed the road to get onto the running path, Thomas passed me and then I moved into 2nd place right after that. We were running along and Thomas turned around and ran backwards to tell me he had no idea where he was going. He definitely didn't expect to be leading the race. I told him there would be volunteers at every spot to direct us if we needed to turn. Another man passed me so I was running in 3rd place.

I loved these pictures of Elise cheering for us at the start of the race.

I went through the first mile right as planned in 7:01. I peeked behind me at a few turns and knew I had a sizable lead on the men behind me and I couldn't see any women nearby. I was very thankful because that first mile had felt rough. My legs weren't burning or tired like they felt running a 5k after a half-marathon, they just felt exhausted. I don't know that I could have maintained that pace if it had been what I needed to run to win. I shifted gears and downgraded to what felt like more of a tempo pace, although much easier, it still didn't feel great. I saw Thomas get passed and move into 2nd place and he was gradually pulling further ahead of me after I slowed my pace. It was crazy that there wasn't anyone between us. Even slowing my pace, the men behind me didn't appear to be closing the gap when I peeked back as I turned a few corners. Mile 2 was 7:28. I looked back and still couldn't see any women in view so I stuck with the pace I was running. I got excited as I neared the track for the finish and heard the kids cheering for me. I looked over and Ty was walking with the kids back over from the Farmer's Market. I held up 9 fingers as I ran across the field to the finish line and got some decent finishing pictures. My last mile was 7:33. I finished in 22:17 and felt like maybe I should have pushed a little harder the last 2 miles so I could have been under 22 minutes, but with how my legs felt the following day, I was glad I didn't run the race hard. I ended up beating the 2nd place female by 2 minutes, so I ran much faster than I needed to!

They posted this photo on their Facebook page and I thought it was really cool!

Thomas brought me a water which was nice since it was very hot and humid. We watched and cheered for everyone finishing. Dad and Jeremy entered the stadium together and then dad outkicked Jeremy. Jeremy was running really weird and I looked at Thomas and said, "Is he going to pass out?" Thomas said he thought so, so we both went running over to him. I poured water on his pressure points and Thomas had him lay down. I ran over and got ice to put down his shirt and we got his legs elevated. Jeremy said he felt like he was going to pass out so it was a good thing we were able to get him cooled off. His brain doesn't do as well with regulating his temperature after the brain injury so running in the heat and humidity does an extra number on him. We stuck around for awards and dad said they told him they need to just have one plaque for overall female and just add the year each time for me, which I got a kick out of! Thomas was 2nd out of 93 total finishers and 1st in his age group with a time of 20:17. I was 3rd overall, 1st out of 44 females, and 1st in my age group with a time of 22:17. Dad was 17th overall and 1st in his age group with a time of 26:01. Jeremy was 18th overall and 6th in his age group with a time of 26:04. Mom walked the mile friendship walk. Ty watched the kids do the obstacle course and then they all cheered everyone on. Afterward we went to the bookstore for Independent Bookstore Day and I was super excited to again find the golden ticket and win a year subscription to Libro.fm! Later in the day I won a raffle at a different independent bookstore so I had a very winning day!