Last Friday, I hadn’t had the chance to fit in my morning run. When I realized I was going to end up running in the evening, I decided to randomly sign up for a 5K. So let me explain… the local running shoe store in the DC area is called Pacers. They not only fit and supply runners in the area with the most updated shoes, but they get the community together by having weekly group runs, running workshops, and by putting on running events. Among these events is the Crystal Run 5K Fridays.

Since I didn’t get my run in and I live walking distance to the start of the Crystal Run 5K, I decided to go ahead and register and run. My sister was coming home from work around the same time, so she put on her running clothes, took the metro to Crystal City, and ran the race with me.

When we arrived to the start line, I was very impressed on the turn out, I never imagine it would be that crowded, but it was. They also had an area where you could get fitted for shoes and try them for the race.

Now, I have always been an endurance athlete, running longer distances for the last 5 years, and marathons, for the last three. This was my fourth certified 5K, and I felt like I was going to die the whole way. When running distance, you have plenty of miles to warm up your body, but when running a 5K you only have 3.10 miles to run (period) so there is really no time to warm up. I ended up sprinting the whole time. In the end, I feel good about my run. I am still unsure of my exact results, but according to my garmin I think I finished around 26 minutes, which isn’t my best 5K time, but not my worst. It just shows that training for longer distances has made me a runner that is comfortable on taking a couple miles to warm up, and although, while training for marathons, I have focused on endurance and consistency, I have not had the opportunity to work on speed.

© 2012