My first 10k!

Sunday was the Statesman Capital 10k in downtown Austin, TX. It was my first 10k. And it was awesome!

It was very odd to run surrounded by hundreds of people. Odd, but pretty cool. It was amazing to think about how many people were out there trying to do this. There were people of all ages, shapes, and sizes. I don’t know how many people raced, but 6500 people completed the timed race. There were tons more who did the fun run. You can see the pictures of the huge crowd online at the Statesman website (http://www.statesman.com/sports/content/cap10k/index.html).

It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but I should have put in more mileage before the race. I’d been doing 45 minute runs, which put me in around 5 miles each time; I should’ve pushed myself to keep going a couple times to reach 6-7 miles. I finished in 1 hour and 15 minutes (5533 out of 6566 timed racers). I didn’t run the entire way, so I know that I can beat that time next year. I’d like to finish in under an hour next year, preferably around 45 minutes or so. It’s something to work towards!

The first half had more hills than the second, but it was motivating to run towards the state capital. Also, there were bands playing around every corner, so it gave me some extra bounce in my step. The most motivating was the high school band playing the Rocky theme at the 3.5 mile mark. People really cheered for that one.

It was very rainy and started pouring just before the race started! It drizzled for most of the race, so the water misters they had set out were not as refreshing as the cold rain. Chris brought our doggy, Roxy, out to the race to get some experience around crowds of people. He told me afterwards that he had about 20 women come over to talk to him! I had several people ask me to pet her after the race, too, so I know that she got lots of time to meet new people. I’m still working with her to make her a good running partner; it’s taking a lot longer than I’d hoped, but she is only four months old. That's a picture of us after the race.

This was really fun to do, and I hope to do it again next year. I was thinking that I might try to do the White Rock Marathon Half-Marathon this year. I want to do a marathon someday, and I think that now is probably better than later.

See more pictures.