Heels & Hills 5K

On May 1st I participated in the Heels and Hills 5K. Keelie & I participated in the Heels and Hills and Him 5K back in September and had a great time. It's nice to participate in an event that is centered on women's health and fitness. When Keelie told me she, her mom, and friends from her First Place 4 Health bible study were doing the event May 1st I decided to join them.

Keelie & I outside the restaurant.

After packet pickup at the Holiday Inn, we headed to dinner at Pappasito's. I was VERY proud of myself for not eating the chips and salsa or the tortillas. It helped that everyone else said the chips were pretty disgusting. That worked to my advantage! ;-)

Keelie with her sweet momma, Mary.

We turned in pretty early Saturday night after a trip to ghetto Target to get some must-have items for the Race, like ponchos and sports bras. Ha. We were up before the sun and headed out to the race site around 6:15. Of course it started to sprinkle, as forecasted, the minute we pulled away from the hotel. We got parked and made our way to the portapotties. It was starting to get pretty cool outside and the sprinkles were a bit heavier now. Keelie decided to not wear her poncho, since it would probably be pretty restrictive during her half marathon run, so I jumped at the opportunity to wear it. We tried to stay out of the weather as much as we could before race time.

Showing off our event shirts and rain gear.

The half marathon, 13.1 miles, started at 7:30 am. Keelie & Lindsey both participated in the half, the first for both of them. We saw them off and then got ready for the next race to start. At 7:35 am Mary & Laura headed out in the 10K, 6.2 miles. Me, Norma, Stacie, & Ruth Ann were next up in the 5K, 3.1 miles. We headed out at 7:45 am. It was ridiculously cold. Then of course about 5 minutes into it the rain started to pour. I saw some women up ahead get out of line and head back to where we started. EVERYTHING in me wanted to do the same, but I just couldn't let myself. I knew everyone else was out here experiencing the same thing and they were doing even more miles than I was. I kept thinking about Keelie running a half marathon in these conditions so I kept chucking along. The poncho helped some, but my windpant capri's were soaked and sticking to me. My shoes and socks were completely wet. I tied my poncho hood down and trucked along. I was trying to walk this 5K as fast as possible. For one reason, I just wanted to be DONE and out of the awful conditions. My hands were so red, chapped, and cold. It really was bad. But I also wanted to beat my time from September. My tennis shoes kept slipping around on the roadway. I was kicking myself for not having used the Groupon I bought for $50 worth of shoes at Run On! I was also worried about my phone. We'd bought snack size baggies at Target the night before to put our phones in incase the weather got bad. Of course I had put my baggie in my pocket and hadn't put it on my phone yet. When I used the portapotty if rolled out of my pocket and onto the floor. I wasn't about to pick it up and use it after that. But a tiny part of me wished I had so I wasn't worried the weather would ruin my dang iPhone. I was making pretty good time despite all the conditions. I had walked my first mile in 15 minutes so based on that I estimated I'd be done with the 5K in around 45 minutes. I was slowing down by the time on my watch thought. Dang it! And then of course my car key, which I'd tied onto my shoe so I wouldn't lose it, started coming lose. Ugh. I was really afraid I'd lose it somewhere on this course. At one point I had to jump over into the median and tie it up tighter. I was so bitter. Then not 5 minutes later my laces started coming completely undone. At that point I had to jump over into the median again, and this time I took the key off and quickly re-tied my shoe, of course losing even more time. Ugh! I carried my key the rest of the way, along with one of my earrings which I'd accidentally ripped out while trying to fix my earphones. I was a mess and so ready to be done. Finally I crossed the finish line!!! I knew I'd finished in under an hour, but I wasn't sure of my exact time. The times were later posted and my chip time was 51:59.0 min, compared to September's time of 52:27.2 min. Bleh. I think it could have been much better minus the weather and my shoe situation. lol. I also came in 29th out of 38th of 5K women in the Athena division, which is women over 150 lbs. It really excited me to not be last. Ha.

After finishing I found Alicia, who'd come to cheer everyone on, and we waited for everyone else to finish. We cheered Mary across the finish line. She ended up coming in 3rd in her age group in the 10K. AWESOME! Then we had quite awhile to wait for Lindsey and Keelie to finish the half. We hit up the breakfast area that had been moved out of the conditions into the garage. It was still freezing in there unfortunately. We found a breezeway by the elevators where we huddled up by the wall and found a little relief from the weather. I huddled in my poncho and was SUPER glad to have it. We knew how fast Lindsey said she'd be running the half so when we thought it was around that time we headed back to the finish line to cheer her on. She crossed pretty soon after we arrived and then she told us they had actually stopped the half at one point because lightning was seen. At that point Keelie called my cell to say she was stopped in a pavilion for the 2nd time and would probably be another hour because they had told them they'd be stopped for 30 min this time. Then all of a sudden Keelie shouted "WE'RE GOING AGAIN!" and then the phone hung up. We knew she was off and running again. We warmed up for about 15 min in Stacie's SUV and then headed back to the finish line to cheer Keelie in!!! It turned out the event cut the half a little short because of the weather, so it was actually more around 12 1/2 miles, but either way Keelie & Lindsey completed it and could have gone another 1/2 mile so they were half marathon finishers in our book!

Yay, we finished!

Medal finishers!

We did it! Stacie, Mary, Norma, Ruth Ann, Keelie, Lindsey, & me

I love this Las Colinas clock/landscaping down the street from the event and Corner Bakery.

After stopping at Corner Bakery to chow down on some much needed food and a warm atmosphere, we headed home.I unfortunately got some pretty good blisters on my feet from my wet socks & shoes. I also got this nasty little blood blister on the corner of my big toe. It was pretty sore for a few days. Now it's just kind of black. Hope that's normal. Ha!

We had a great time yet again at Heels and Heels. Definitely check out Keelie's post about her first half marathon! I consider she and Lindsey rockstars!!!