Saturday, November 22, 2008

Braedon's 1st Race

What a difference a week makes. Last Saturday, the race’s scheduled day, the race was postponed, although fairly warm, due to the course conditions after several days of rain. The water remaining on the course today was frozen and, while bright and sunny, the race time temperature was twenty-six degrees. There was a slight delay in the start time while the race coordinators made some last minute preparations, which allowed us more time to properly warm up. Braedon and I went on several short warm-up runs. Some observers may call this “chase a three-year-old around a field and then carry him back to Mom,” but I can call it a warm-up run.



When we were called to the starting area, my biggest challenge was to get Braedon situated in the stroller. Just as earlier in the week, Braedon didn’t want to cover up with a blanket. It took a strong bit of reasoning to cover him up with the blanket.
Once the gun went off, he did a good job of keeping us on course by pointing out the next flag marking the route. He also said, “They’re getting farther away,” when talking about the runners in front of us…nice encouragement. There were a few hills, and the stroller’s engine almost stalled on the upside. Most of the course was on grass, but we did one lap on the track. That track felt so smooth after running and pushing the stroller over frozen bumpy grass. I was putting forth a bit more of an effort than I anticipated, but the nice thing about a 5K is that the discomfort does not last too long. And once the finish line was in sight, we had no choice but to kick it into the next gear. In a photo-finish, it was Braedon that crossed the line ahead of me by a stroller-length with a time of 26:13. Not bad at all for our first race together. Later in the day we admired the new necklaces that we won and our race shirt, and then ate a big lunch before naptime.

1 comment:

Barry said...

Way to go, gentlemen! Looks chilly out there!

Great pics!