The Peachtree Road Race ... 2011 Recap

Each year on the 4th of July, I wake up early and run a 10K with 60 - 70K of my closest friends. Its a really amazing experience and very patriotic. As I'm sitting here with my right leg covered in ice, I thought I'd give you a few play by play moments of the race:

• It was hot ... probably the hottest race I've ran in years. The humidity was just down right nasty, but the spirit in the air kept you moving. 
• Prior the race, three Raptors did a fly over which was pretty amazing and raised the hair on the back of your neck.  Call me a kid, but I still get excited about military fly overs. 
• Most of my running partners and friends bailed, so I ran with one of Retired Sorority grirls friends (Nikki) and caught up with Chuck and Sarah (old friends from Furman). 
• The first mile ... well, was too quick.  When you pace around 10 minutes and you do the first one in 830, its not a bad thing, just not overly good.  Probably because I was too busy talking, I stopped for water and a bathroom break at mile one that allowed me to finally stretch out. Also a good point that I'm taking much more time off in June of next year. The 80 hour work weeks clearly don't help with the training process.  
• Finally going well on Mile 2 and 3 -- good rhythm, lots of cool people out ... 
• Right before the hill at the Sheppard clinic, I encountered a behemoth of a person (good double deuce and a half fo sho) who decided to fall in front of me. As I darted to the right, my angle decided to go left ... body went right ... snap, crackle, pop -- the race is no longer fun. 
• I power walked through the rest of mile 3.5 - 4.5 trying to figure out if I needed to stop.  I had this really neat tingling feeling in my ankle and it decided to swell up quickly.  
• At mile 4.5, I took a pit stop, stretched out my ankle, ate one of those vanilla instant calorie goo things (totally unnecessary for a 10K but I took it to distract the the behemoth caused) and the carried on.
• I slowly jogged all the way to the finish line and limped across -- needless to say, I was not as thrilled as all the other people around me. In fact, I was down right pissed ... I finished in about 80 minutes which isn't very good, but it was also the first race I've done on a bum ankle.  At least I finished, I could have (and thought about ) giving up multiple times.  
• If you have to get hurt, get hurt at these races. Love the medical tent -- everyone is so nice and give you all sorts of ice, drinks, and other fun things (pills, pain reliever, etc.) 

So while the race wasn't great from a personal performance perspective, it was a very cool experience.  I'm certainly motivated to get in much better shape so I can quality in a higher location so I don't spend 1/2 the race darting left to right dodging the giant people -- but good for them for doing it at least.  I know of a lot of others that didn't do the race.  Now to prepare for the 1/2 marathon on Thanksgiving ... me thinks I'm more than motivated for that race.  

Onward and upward ... Happy 4th Everyone. I'm off to replenish all the calories I lost and move as little as possible.