First 5K of 2012

I missed the first official 5K of the year on the Great Lakes Navy Base because we were traveling back from my grandmother's funeral. Because of that, my first 5K of the year was on Monday the 2nd of April. I ran on the Navy Base in the monthly Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) event.

What I like the most about these races is that they give me a chance to test my ability against young Sailors who are in infinitely better shape than I am. What I like even more than that is beating them. I don't beat most of them by far, but I do beat many. Mostly it's because their studies are pretty demanding and I have a higher dedication to running than they do.

At any rate, I ran my first race without being in as good of shape as I wanted to be in. I can count the number of long runs I've done on one hand with 6 miles being the longest. Nevertheless, I lined up with about 230 other Sailors and civilians and took off.

I'll map the course some other time, perhaps during May's race, and show you, but the bottom line is that it's a pretty nice course. We get to run past the clock tower (pictured at night, above) and all over the base.

Mostly, I'm happy to have finished at all. I finished at 25:58 for an 8:23 split. My first mile was at 8:58, so I dropped the average quite a bit. Out of the 230 or so runners, I finished at 144. Not great, but not as bad as I've done before either.

All in all, it was a good race. Can't wait for the next one! The only thing missing from this race were my good buddies ET1 Mike Harris, who is busy with his retirement paperwork (he retires Friday) and FC1 Jeff Martin, who was not selected last year for a PTS (Perform to Serve) quota. Missed you guys!