{MIMM #12} Leprechaun Race Confessions

Hello Friends!

If you are friends with me on Facebook…you might be sick of all the Leprechaun Chase talk.

For those of you who weren’t bombarded with green craziness (sorry, my new race friends got excited about tagging all of the pictures!), then here is a full sea of green for you!

I participated in my first race this year on Saturday…and it was a rough but awesome one.

For those of you who don’t know, the Leprechaun Chase is basically a battle of the sexes.  The “lasses” start 5 minutes ahead of the “lads” and the first person to finish wins their gender free green beer.  Well, with the amount of people at the race, it took awhile to even get to the start line, so a lot of the lasses end up starting with the lads.

Confession: I hadn’t run 6 miles in…a very long time.  Not this year at least.

Needless to say I was a little nervous about this run. 

Confession: I rode up with people I’ve never met before so that I wouldn’t be alone at the race.  Because I didn’t want another race like the Color Run…one of those runs that are fun to run with people and not super competitive.  Or so I thought!

I was originally planning on going up with the roomie Amber, but she has still been hanging out with her mom (Team Carol Facebook Page here) in the hospital, who actually encouraged Amber to run the race because she is awesome.  I didn’t really know anyone else doing the race, so I lamely asked on our running group’s Facebook page (I’ve met about 3 of the 95 members) to ride or follow someone to the race.

It worked out well though because gal I went with was super sweet.  Although when she took her shirt off and stood next to me at the post-race pictures I felt like a chubster.  Seriously. 

Source

She also got 4th in her division!  Such a speedster!

Confession: Those sock things I’m wearing were actually meant to be tattoo sleeves.

Confession: I actually took some time trying to figure out what to wear…shorts vs pants…short-sleeved vs long-sleeved…this process involved taking pictures and tweeting, Facebooking or texting them to people.  HI My name is Amanda and I apparently take a lot of pictures of myself.

Confession: I was kind of sore starting out on this race because in a panic, I ran outside for the first time in a couple of weeks…two days prior to race day.  My roomie had warned me earlier that week that I should get some outdoor runs in because the course was tough.

Confession: I don’t usually “warm-up” before races because I want to make sure I can actually make it the whole distance.  My warm-up usually happens the first mile of the race.  Not this time!  The Freaky Fast Runners group decided to run about half a mile beforehand.

The only picture I found of me running…what are my arms doing??  Am I pretending to ride a bike??

And I’m actually pretty happy we did because I realized I definitely did not need a long-sleeved shirt AND sweatshirt.

Confession: I like to start towards the back of the runners so I can feel really awesome passing people.  I think this actually might not work to my advantage since I tend to get stuck behind people when the races are super packed.

Yeah I tried to ignore these signs and just treated them like the “passing lane”….but the boys got kind of mean!  I would try to pass people and all of a sudden I’d get nearly trampled.  Not cool, lads.

Confession: I set my ipod on Flyleaf and seriously enjoyed my race (when I wasn’t in fear of being trampled).  It was very entertaining seeing all of the crazily dressed up runners and I thought it was pretty outside.  Although it was chilly and rainy, there really is something about running outdoors with scenery to look at.

Confession: I wasn’t really worried about time at all…I just wanted to finish the darned race!

Guess what?  I set a personal record!  I was quite surprised at my final pace because all of the runs I’ve done by myself or with a group even have averaged out to be around the 10:30 minute/mile region.  I’m pretty excited I got below the 10 minute mark!  A whole 6 minutes faster than my last 10K race!  I think the craziest part was that it was so hilly and towards the end my nose started running like a faucet, but I made it!  I survived and conquered!

Confession: After taking the longest, most awesome shower ever (it gets a little gross when you hang out awhile after the race and then sit through a long car-ride home, plus I was FREEZING after the race), all I really wanted was chips and dip.  So that’s what I had for my post-race meal.

And it hit. the. spot.

Last confession: In all the fun race madness, I forgot to do a Stats assignment.  I sheepishly e-mailed my teacher today and she thankfully is letting me turn it in late for partial credit.  Oops.

Kind of worth it.

Happy Monday to you all!  Wish me luck on my 4 tests this week!!

Check out more pictures and some crazy costumes from the event here:
Leprechaun Race 10K Site
Mahoney State Park Facebook Page

How’s the weather in your area?  It’s been SNOWING here!  Yes, the day after I ran in shorts, it snowed.  That’s Nebraska for ya!

Do you have any similar race confessions?

Linking up to the lovely Diva for MIMM or Marvelous in my Monday: