I almost choked at the water station!

Yes I know it sounds silly.   Today was the Y-Me 5K race and it was such a gorgeous day today.  It was at 8am and I got downtown at about 7:15.  I did not realize how much further north the starting line was so I then started walking a little bit faster since I still had to go to the bathroom and drop off my gear.

I did not wait long in line.  I was behind a lady that was running in the Vibram FiveFingers and we just started talking about them.  She was raving about them which got me motivated to start training in mine.  Anyway, the port-a-potties were pink!  So cute and definitely clean.  They were the ones that you had to press down a lever/handle with your foot to flush.

I dropped off my gear and made my way to the starting line.  If you read my post from last week you know that from now on I am determined to get as close as possible to the starting line.  There were so many people!  The race was divided into two components: 1.) 5K runners (pink bibs) and 2.) 1 or 3 mile walkers (white bibs).  There were even signs to let people know that the pink bibs go first.  Of course the walkers were at the front of the line.  I was NOT happy about this.  I did point it out to a few girls with white bibs telling them that since they were walkers they had to move back to the end of the line.  One of the girls told me that they were meeting their friends up front.  I let it go.  I mean, I told myself “Come on it is Mother’s Day”.  I then proceeded to move up as close as possible.  Well, the gun went off and we started walking.  We kept on walking and I realized that I was STILL behind a lot of runners.  I then wasted energy zigzagging through people to get away from them.  I finally did and was among runners and a few walkers.

I was not off to a good start.  Somehow my Garmin watch was not working.  I turned it on as I waited in line and waited for the satellite to find my location.  It was not working so I turned it off and turned it back on.  Whew, finally it worked.  Well, I was wrong!!!!  As I was running I noticed that the pace numbers were changing but not the time nor the distance.  Ugh!  Well, I just turned it off and kept on running.  

The water station was a little bit after 1.5 miles.  At least that is what it seemed like.  I grabbed one cup of water and chugged it down.  I grabbed another one but I was so thirsty and also breathing very fast so can just imagine what happened.  Oh my goodness!  In all of my races that had never happened.  I guess I shouldn’t say that I almost choked but instead I did choke.  I was coughing like crazy.  My eyes were watery and people were looking at me but did not ask if I was OK.  “That is OK people.  Keep on running.  I don’t want you to miss your PR”.  🙁 

The rest of the race was not too bad.  There were a few more inclines but I tried to run through most of them.  I dislike inclines very much.  I don’t know what my official finish time is but I am estimating around 32:30 or so.  Not bad considering that the incident at the water station.

Next race is the Magellan Chicago Spring Half Marathon and 10K.  Originally I was signed up for the half marathon but changed it to the 10K.  That is OK.  I don’t think I am ready for another half marathon after last week’s disastrous race.  I have a few weeks to mentally prepare for the 13.1 Chicago on June 4.  I am going to rock that one!!!