The time on my watch said 7:53 am. The race was supposed to start in 8 O'clock. The problem is that I was still in the car, waiting to get into the Soldier Field parking garage. And once I found a place to park, I still had to help my wife unload our 4 kids and the stroller, and then make it over to the starting line. I resigned myself to the idea that I wasn't going to be running the Run to Remember 5k that morning. I figured I would just walk with them, and try to enjoy the beautiful morning.
I'm still in the post-marathon 'relaxation mode'. But Tom, one of my running buddies, and I planned to meet at the start and we were going to let it go a little. We were curious to see what kind of time we could run considering my post-race soreness, and his injury-recovery status. But as we walked up toward the start, the race was already starting. Oops. That allowed me to get a picture of the leaders at the start anyway. Tom, however, was long gone.
So we worked our way to the back of the starting line as the last of the walkers with strollers were leaving. That's when my wife told me to go ahead and run. She would walk with the kids and let them enjoy some of the activities there. As you can see, they found a couple friends to play with.
Well, after a moment of hesitation where I tried to determine whether she really meant it, I decided to go ahead and run. I hadn't warmed up or stretched. It was almost ten minutes after the start, and I was going to have to weave my way around and through the walkers and joggers, but at least I'd get a little bit of a workout in.
Once I hit the first mile mark I looked at my watch and discovered I'd failed to start it. That seemed to go along perfectly with the rest of the morning at that point. Once again, I decided not to worry about it. It wasn't like I was going to run a good time under those conditions anyway. I was guessing the first mile was somewhere around 8:00. At that point in the race though at least I was pretty much past the walkers. I just had to find gaps to make my way past some of the runners at the back of the pack.
Apparently in my haste while I was weaving through the runners, I missed the highlight of the race that my friend, John Garrido later told me about. There was a keg at the turnaround point where runners could replentish the carbs with something other than gatorade! John used that as an excuse for his slower than expected time!
As I neared the finish there was some guy huffing and puffing his way to a sprint finish, so I decided to go with him, and try to encourage him to make it all the way in. That probably helped my time a little as well. When I met up with my family and Tom at the end however, I had no idea what my time was. The finish line clock was useless, since I had started too late. I guessed it was in the neighborhood of 24 minutes. Tom's watch shoed he managed to run one second under his goal time of 22 minutes.
I was curious though, so I checked the website to find my actual finishing time according to the chip. When I saw it I started laughing. First of all, I saw that the winner of the race was a friend of mine from High school. Coincidently, Rob Chenoweth and I were both at an event at Fleet Feet Sports the night before, where we both were out too late, and enjoyed more adult beverages than advisable given that we both had a race the next day. Not that either of us were too worried about it. When we chatted at the event, neither one of us mentioned we were running the next morning.
And it turns out I ran a little quicker than I thought. Under the best of conditions, I would expect to run very close to 20 minutes even. Maybe a little faster. But these were far from the best conditions. I still apparently ran well enough to finish third in my age group. My time was 22:17, which was good for 71st place of about 1500 finishers.
None of that really mattered much. More importantly, my wife and kids had a good time. And we were all there to support a very worthwhile organization that helps support the families of Chicago Police officers killed in the line of duty. This was the fifth year of the race, and the best one yet. Next year, you should consider adding it to your calendar!
See you on the roads.....
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