Alexandria Turkey Trot

I had already been thinking about doing a turkey trot 5K this year when Jessie sent out an email about the Alexandria 5 miler. It's a little longer (2 miles) than a 5K and definitely a lot further away from Fairfax.... but doing it with friends is always preferable than no company, right?  Of course a week after I signed up, everyone who was going to do it bailed, so now I'm driving all the way to Alexandria to do FIVE whole miles by myself (with the ironman budget what it is, it just didn't make sense to blow another race registration and sign up for a 2nd - closer - race).  Oh well, big girl panties are on so let's go...

The drive to Alexandria was fairly uneventful, and I was able to park and get my packet with plenty of time to spare.  What now?  I sat in the car a bit, stood in line for the port-o-johns, sat in the car a bit more, stood around in the school lobby (where packet pickup was) and then finally it was time to start lining up.  I saw Sherri and Leanne and a couple others with Team Z shirts on that I didn't recognize, and we exchanged our hello's.  I was ready to get this thing over with!

I started a slow jog, trying to keep my heart rate down for awhile so that maybe I could run the whole thing.  People were passing me, but I kept myself from getting wrapped up in the excitement and go faster than I should.  Dogs and strollers were welcome in this race, but were supposed to start after everyone else and from a different spot, so imagine my surprise when I kept having strollers right up on my ass.  So freaking annoying!  Funny, the dogs didn't bother me at all...

One mile down, all running, and I was pleased.  But 4 more miles is a long way to go.  I kept trudging along, and we saw the leaders of the race pass by in the other direction and everyone cheered.  Then we saw the first women and everyone cheered again.  Then, amazingly, not too long after that, we saw the lead dog runner!!  I cheered my butt off for him, of course.  My heart rate was getting higher.  Like, seriously higher, high zone 4 easy.  I think that's allowed in a race though??  Passed the second mile marker and I'm still going strong, and the heart rate hit zone 5.  I wasn't feeling terrible though and just kept on plugging away. 

There was a water stop just at the third mile marker and I decided it was OK to walk for that.  Then, I realized I needed to rest a bit and bring my heart rate down a little, so I walked about a quarter of a mile.  Back to jogging, and now my heart rate is all over the place, zone 4, zone 2, zone ZERO??  Weird.  I had to walk once more toward the end of that 4th mile, but was able to get back into my groove and run that last mile to a strong finish, and Sherri was there to cheer me across the line!  Anti-climatic though, as I didn't have any people with me, so I grabbed a bottle of water and did a cool-down walk to my car. 

The one thing I hate about Turkey Trots is that there is no post-race breakfast place open.  I settled for some iced tea and a slice of awful ginger bread from a coffee shop near my house.  I took a super long hot shower, and then lounged around for awhile until it was time to head to Mom's for Thanksgiving, along with Joann & Daz and Jon and his family.  Another Thanksgiving is in the books.