Firecracker Run

Most everyone knows that I ran in the annual O'Fallon Firecracker Run. This is my second year of running it (only my 2nd 5K to run ever). I had an awesome running buddy. When I wanted to quit, she kept me going; and if I did quit, she didn't put me down. We had our struggles through training since we started running at the end of March. The weather was always fun to plan around. We ran in the pouring rain, strong wind, and there was only one thing that would keep us from running...lightning. The longer timed segments of our run seemed so much harder since they were perfectly planned when the temperatures went up along with the humidity. We also learned that we are morning runners. Anything after 8am is too late (There was a day we tried to run in the afternoon and we both almost threw up)! Since time was an issue, we had to plan out every week and make sure we could run before school during the school year and before the children woke up. After school was out, we tried to run before the blistering heat. Perfect conditions would be somewhere in the 60s - 70s with low humidity if anyone cares. =)

The beginning of the race.

Near the end of the race.

Me finishing the race.

My running buddy, Laura, and me after the race.

Our first goal was to complete the race running (no walking allowed). The other goal was to finish under 32 minutes and we DID!!! We plan to keep running and hopefully improve times. It has been so fun to do something good for myself and to enjoy some adult/no child interrupted time.

Thanks to Laura for being such an awesome running partner! Thanks for keeping me motivated when I was ready to quit and making sure I got all my runs in. Hopefully we'll have many more races we can do together.