Cameron with his ribbon!
Justin with his ribbon :-)
Claire and her ribbon
Kids before the run
Mommy and Daddy after our run!
Let me just start this post off by saying that we will never run this race again.
That being said.....
This was a VERY local race for us, the only one within 15 minutes of our back door, and it had a pee-wee run for the kids (free of charge) after the 5K. Registration was from 6:30-7:45, race began at 8am. We got there about 7:25, my mom met us there to watch the kids while we ran. After Chris got our packets, we went to register the kids for their race, which was located at the finish line, so mom and the kids could see where they would need to meet us at. The kids were so excited to get bibs to pin on their shirts!!!! (and, kudos to them, ALL the kids were #1!!!) Then, we made our way back to the start area, Justin needed to use the bathroom, so I took him in for that (and for me to pee too) and as I came out of the school, they were urging runners to line up. Chris and I said a quick goodbye to the kids, and headed over to the start line. There were a lot, and I mean, A LOT of young kids there....the 13-17 year old cross country kids, I am betting at least 1/2 the race was in high school. As we were listening to the endless "rules" from the PA announcer (who, by the way, knows how to 'run' a race b/c she is the P.E. teacher?!?!?!) Chris starts cracking jokes about some of the stuff going on, and no one laughs. at all. BUMMER. these people are snobs, and are taking this race WAY to seriously......
The timer goes off and we are on our way.....the race is pretty simple, 4 right turns. There are a lot of people, and Chris pulls ahead of me really early, I decide to hang out at my slow 9 minute mile pace and finish when I finish..... I am getting passed left and right (literally) by these high school kids, and it is kind of annoying b/c they (most of them) were rude and bumping into me and NOT saying excuse me.....I sincerely hope my children have manners when/if they run races later in life.....anyways.... I hit the 1 mile mark at 8:52 and was feeling pretty OK, not great ~~ my knee had been kind of rubbery/stiff feeling the past few days, so I rested it for about 2 days before the run, and it was aching a lil bit at the 1 mile, so I decided to ignore the Garmin and listen to my body (knee) instead.....
I kept on running and was feeling OK, not great, not bad, and was still getting thoroughly annoyed at the kids in the race, and the serious-ness of it, no one was talking or joking, anywhere!!! Around the 1.75 mile (I think) I heard a younger girl breathing kinda funny, really wheezy and short choppy breaths. I glanced over my left shoulder just as she fell down. And she didn't really fall, she collapsed or crumpled, she just folded her tiny lil body all up on top of itself, I have never seen such a thing. NOBODY stopped but me!!!!! *PISS OFF JERKS* (not like any of them will ever read this, but it REALLY pisses me off) I grabbed her shoulder and asked if she was ok.....she was trying desperately to get her asthma inhaler thingee out of her pocket, and she looked up at me and said, with tears in her eyes, "I don't wanna die"...... ummm..... TERROR! what am I supposed to do??? "god, help me to help this little girl" I looked all over the place and couldn't find a race staff person anywhere, so I helped her to the next driveway where some spectators were parked in their lawn chairs, and had their cell phone. The man called 911 while the lady went to consoling the little girl. I stood there dumbly just watching and the old man told me to go finish the race, they'd take care of her now. I thanked him, and took off. About 2-3 minutes later, I could hear the sirens getting closer, and I knew she would be in good hands now. The more I ran, the more pissed off I got. Who in the world could possibly think that 90 seconds on your official time is more important than helping some young kid???? When does it all become me, me, me??? I honestly don't remember anything about the last mile, except that I was worrying about her, I never got her name or anything. When I finally did cross the finish line, I was mostly concerned about her, and quite happy to see my kids.... it is an amazing feeling to have 4 lil people whom I created watch mommy cross the finish line!
I went to get some water and heard the PA announcers saying that they needed the parents of (insert name here) to ambulance 14 immediately. I can only assume that was her, I did overhear some EMT's saying that she was standing on her own and just wanted her mom, again, I am assuming they are talking about the same girl.
Meanwhile, Chris PR'ed it in record (duh) time -- he finished in under 25 minutes!!!!! CRAZ-eeee!!!
The kids ran their race after ours. They had it broken down into age groups, 2-3 year olds, 4-5 year olds, 6-7 year olds, and ages 8+. So, none of our kids were against each other (whew!!!)
The youngest ones ran a short out and back, and the course got longer for each succeeding age group. The kids had fun, although, Justin was mad b/c he wanted to run a "real road race" like Mommy and Daddy!!! But, they each got a bib, a ribbon, and some orange pop from McDonald's.
We didn't stick around after the race b/c we wanted to go home, we had about 1600 other things to get done! Before we were even back at the van, we decided this was a NO for next year (or ever) the people were just too rude, the RRCA racers are way too serious, and it just wasn't fun. I'd never race if they were all like this!
Our official times:
Chris~24:57
8:01 mile
8th out of 11 male 30-34
259 out of 665 racers
Julie ~ 28:53
9:17 mile
14th out of 26 female 30-34
383 out of 665 racers
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