EVENT: Los Angeles Chinatown Firecracker 5KDATE: Sunday, February 12, 2016
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
RACE BEGAN: 08:00 am
FINISH TIME: 0:27:14
This is the first post of 2017, and probably for good reason. It has been raining an awful lot, more than we are used to here in sunny Southern California, so many of my workouts have been indoors and not very long nor exciting.
Well, the "not very long" part has more to do with my schedule than anything else. I try to wake up early to work out, but in order to get the boy to and from school in a timely manner and still fit in eight hours of work, I'm mostly doing 30 minutes most days and am okay with this.
I have also spent the last several weeks with another cold from the down-side of afterlife. I had one of these in November, and here we are again. This time, I had pink eye in both eyes, twice, as a bonus after Tuesday picked it up from school. I swear I was being really careful, though anyone who knows me knows that I can't help but touch my eyes more than the average bear.
Anyway, just as I was starting to feel better in the days before this annual race, I had a really itchy throat all of a sudden and coughed until I gagged many times and later found that I had pulled one of those intercostal rib muscles in the process. It was surprisingly painful, since every sneeze, cough, or deep breath was painful.
So along with the fact that I had been so sick that I actually skipped a week of working out at all (unheard of for me), my new cough injury was making the thought of running quite horrible. Still, I needed to do this and needed to do it fast enough so that The Ukrainian could run the 10k, which started half an hour after the 5k. We did this last year, and it was pretty successful so that both of us were able to run without getting a babysitter.
The run itself was uneventful, thankfully. During the first mile, I realized I was going to be okay. Sure, my ribs were feeling sore when I moved a certain way, but I could tough it out for a few miles. The next mile was hillier, and my lungs, weakened from weeks of coughing, prompted me to walk a little bit, but once the turnaround point neared, I started up again and obviously took advantage of the downhill.
You can see my finish time above. Not bad, considering how little I've been running these days and all the other stuff.
While The Ukrainian did the 10k, I took Tuesday through the refreshment area, where he ate my post-race food, but I guess that's what we get for waking him up an hour early.
I had signed him up for the Kiddie Run (1K), since I figured he'd be up for this kind of thing when I signed up during the summer. While he was into it for some parts like the group stretching and the first few moments of the race, I think he was starting to tire of the racing scene since by then, we had been there for about two hours. Maybe next time!
Here's the loot:
If you have been following for a while, this was my sixth Firecracker run, so I'm halfway to my goal of collecting all 12 Firecracker Run medals. This race is always so great -- casual, and great shirts!
2017 - Rooster
2016 - Monkey
2015 - Ram
2014 - Horse
2013 - Snake (we did the bike ride that year!)
2012 - Dragon
As for the immediate future, I actually have a half-marathon in about three weeks. I'm hoping to post again before then, once I start feeling better and more optimistic since these past few months have been pretty rough: back pain, bad cold, another bad cold, and pulled rib. But there is more I'd like to talk about -- some pretty awesome stuff -- regarding running and fitness. So... stay tuned if you're still out there.
Comments
Post a Comment