Autumn Chase was Thursday, September 18. This is a one-mile event for elementary students in Huntsville, AL. Our team volunteers by pacing the runs (each grade has two races--one for boys and one for girls so there are many races to pace). Rick and I alternated running the one-mile races this year. I think I did about 5 miles total. I paced an adorable little boy in the kindergarten race who just wanted someone to walk with. He was so tired and was crying so I didn't push him. At the end of the race, I asked if he had his mom or anyone waiting for him at the finish. He spotted his brother and quickly started running for him! I guess he just needed the right motivation.
My daughter wanted me to run with her in her race. I stayed near her for much of the race. With just a little left to go, she was in 3rd place. The girls who were in 1st and 2nd were neck and neck, just right in front of her. So I yelled, "C'mon girls! Who wants 1st place?" and I veered off to watch them finish. Well, my daughter just took off! She passed those other girls and sprinted to the finish. I was so proud of her! She got an 8:04. My son ran his race after hers and got 9th overall with a time of 7:24. They both helped clean up the flags and cones after the races had ended. I sat and tried to get my baby to take her bottle! She prefers to be nursed, but she will take a bottle if it's warm. This one was not but I didn't want it to go to waste and frankly it was not a very convenient place to nurse.
Liz Hurley Volunteering
My family went to stuff packets for the Liz Hurley 5K on Saturday, October 4. This is a GREAT way for families to volunteer! I always leave feeling a little guilty since we are treated to many freebies! Today, we were given a free Mexican lunch and many snacks. My whole family helped (and the baby napped). My son actually got to a table and had begun stuffing the packets before I did! There were 7,000 packets to stuff, so I guess we made a dent in that but there was more to do when we left.
New and Old Long Runs
Below are two runs from almost exactly a year apart. The top was 14 miles this past Saturday, October 11, 2014. The bottom was 13.1 miles last year on October 11, 2013. Though the average on the top one is messed up (forgot to hit stop on the Garmin), they really were very similar times. Seems like I'm hanging out near 8:45 pace right now in runs from 10-14 miles. It's encouraging to notice that my runs have returned to where I was last year in both their times and distances (I didn't use the Garmin at all for a whole year--these runs were nearly back-to-back in my data). My two goal races for winter are the Rocket City Marathon (pacing the 4:10 group) and Mountain Mist 50K. I need long runs in order to do these races. I have about 8 weeks to get up to a 20 mile run and then taper to the marathon. I am running about 3 miles 5 times a week a week with one longer run. I'm feeling good and am slowly returning to running!
