My 1st 10k Race!

After getting to goal on 5th May, I had another milestone to reach on the 7th May. Yep my 1st 10k race.

I had been looking forward to this and dreading this at the same time. In training the furthest I managed to run was 6.5kilometres in 50mins. So I was a little worried about running the full 10k! In fact I was terrified! 

I had not had any chance to go for any runs in Paris and when I got back from Paris I had a week of covering for my manager so I had to work every day and after work the evenings seemed to be full of things to do. So I didn’t get to run before the race for 2 weeks! Eeeek!

The rules state that you must be able to run the 10k within 1 hour and 30 minutes. This scared me more! What if I couldn’t do it?! 

Luckily for me, my Uncle was very encouraging and said that I could do it etc… and as mentioned in previous posts he has signed up for a few events with me this year (apart from the all female events – in which his daughter, my wonderful cousin has signed up to do with me!) When we arrived I was so nervous but just couldn’t wait to get it done and get my first medal of 2012! 

The shotgun went off and away we went. In the rain. Why does it always rain on me? We started off at a gentle pace, and my Uncle said he would stay with me through this the whole time. I said he could go off because I didn’t want to ruin his time, but he didn’t mind which was nice. It started so well, until we were at 2.5km and hit our first incline! The pain seared through me, I wanted to be sick & walk for a bit. Haha, my Uncle was having none of it and told me to keep going unless I was going to be sick but then to keep going after. I wasn’t sick, I kept going and I didn’t walk for a bit. Besides, I had to get round within an hour and a half. At the 3km point after my mini break down, my cousin and Auntie were waiting to take photos, I waved and it gave me a pick me up. I remember at 5k looking at my watch for the first time – 33mins… just realising that I had run my fastest 5k ever! This gave me a boost and I was fine until I got to 8km. We had been through mud, the park and some streets. We came back into the park with 2km to go and my legs just let me down. They were seizing up and it was agony. My Uncle told me that my cousin and Auntie were waiting just up the road with a camera so I had to push on, run hard and smile. So I did! The picture is in my blog and is my favourite picture of me ever. I must admit you can’t even see my fat bits, I am at goal weight, smiling, running and looking great. Inside I was screaming but hey – no pain and all that!

Anyway, I managed to get round and finished in 1 hour and 16 mins.

Proud is all I can say. I was so proud of myself!

The events diary is getting pretty full now, and June is going to be super cool!

After completing this 10k I signed up for an extra 10k event before my big London 10k which I cannot wait for! So here is how the events calendar is looking: 

June 4th – Hatfield 10k
June 17th – Race for Life 5k
June 23rd – Starlight Walk Half Marathon
July 8th – London 10k
September 29th – Shine 2012 Full Marathon!!!

And I cannot wait!