Race Report - Up and Running 5k...and a little extra

So I ran the second race in Fleet Feet Albuquerque's Gran Prix 5k series. This one was familiar but a little different. The race was on the Bosque bike trail starting at the Alameda Open Space, where I generally run since it's so close to home. This one started up on the bridge though, over the river, went down under Alameda and continued a little passed Paseo before turning around and going back...very familiar for the most part, except for the giant, steep hill around Mile 3. It's not a long hill, but it's very steep.

Overall it was a great race, complete with lots of friends. It was freezing cold with a headwind all the way through the turn around, complete with a little snow (or ice...one flake hurt when it smacked me in the lip). I finished in 41:09 and I was thrilled with it considering I haven't had time to run during the week BUT I managed to run the entire thing without stopping. This is one of my goals for the year - I really want to get better at running further without walk breaks. I still plan on taking walk breaks for Chicago, but if I can make it through a half without stopping, I'll be elated.

In other news, I had a 6 mile training run yesterday, which I was a little nervous for. Again, I haven't had the time to run as much as I should and I honestly haven't run that far since NYC. Not only did I make the 6 miles without dying, it was the fastest I've ever run that distance. I went in with a plan though. I ran the first and last miles as slow as I wanted (13:30 pace for the first mile) and then each of the middle miles faster than the one before. So, for Mile 2 I had to keep it below 13:00 pace, Mile 3 was below 12:50 pace, Mile 4 was below 12:45 pace and Mile 5 had to be below 12:40 pace...the exciting part was that I never saw my watch go above 12:20 on Mile 5. Yeah, I know that's crawling for some people, but I was blown away. Overall I finished in 1:17:25...before that my fastest was 1:20. I'm glad I set up my watch to show my current pace, so I'm going to see if I can keep this going.

Not much else is going on. Work's been nuts, but it should have calmed down over the weekend. I have an appt with the podiatrist tomorrow because my foot isn't getting any better - actually my Achilles is starting to bother me now and I'm getting a little worried about it. Maybe it wasn't PF after all. I'll update once I get some answers from the doc tomorrow. The permits have been pulled for the new house and the foundation will be started tomorrow. I can't wait to see our new home come up from the ground (literally)! I'll be back with pictures once we get some dirt moved around. :)