Wednesday, September 5, 2007

Crosswinds 5K

To calm my pre-wedding nerves and as a benefit to Sands Cancer Center in Canandaigua, New York, I ran a 5K with about 354 other participants, coming in 258th. An asthma attack prevented the finish I had hoped for, but I came close -- 31:38. I had hoped for a 30 minute finish, but this 10:11 mile pace was okay (Photos by Nelson Bowen). Above: the line up. Below: that's me near the finish line.
At the rear left is Steve Bragg, my virtual running partner. He ran a 27:12 5K, a 8:46 mile pace, according to the statistics at http://www.crosswindsonline.org/. We share our individual running goals via e-mail and cheer each other on when we reach them. He's been working 4 p.m. to 4 a.m. all summer, so I am pretty amazed at his ability to finish so well. The couple in front is my dad and his wife Delores. That, too, is pretty amazing to me. Until I started running four years ago, I never did anything very athletic. Now I'm 50 and Dad will be 80 in November, and he saw me finish a race for the very first time. Oh! I almost forgot Bart...that little Terrier-Pom mix is quite a runner himself. Though he didn't run this particular race with me, he used to run with me about once a week when I lived in Canandaigua. Those little legs hustle!

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