Papa John's 10 Miler Race Recap and less than 2 weeks to go!

Last weekend I ran in the Papa John's 10 miler on a whim.  I had been thinking about it for a few weeks.  I met my neighbor's adult daughter, who is a triathlete, and she told me she had a bib available.  Then I didn't hear from her until the day before the race.  As a result, there was a scramble of phone calls made and chaos to make the last minute plans to get this in order.  Erin and I had already made tentative plans to at least run the course, since it was good Boston practice for me, and both of us had the same mileage planned.  It took a little convincing to get her to run, but in the end, it worked out that I was able to ride down with my neighbor Jen, and Erin rode with her boyfriend Dan, who would pace Jen.  Jen's husband, Chris, also went down and drove separate.  It was kind of crazy getting to the start, and I am glad I went with Jen.  She is a University of Louisville grad, and the course started near and finished in the University of Louisville's Papa John's Cardinal Stadium, and happened to be on the same day that Uof L played UK, so there was lots of excitement in the morning.

Jen's plan was to have Dan pace her to a PR.  I am not sure of what her pace ended up being, but I knew she would be faster than me.  Erin and I decided that today should be a fast training run.  Initially, she thought it should be slower, but with some last minute advice from Dan, she was in agreement to "push it a little".  I wanted to average 8min/miles.  I had actually run this course twice already, the first time as the last 9ish miles of my second 20 miler, and then the next time as the first 9 miles of my last 20 miler.  The only difference was that the race took us around the park in a clockwise manner instead of counter clockwise, so the hills felt a little different, but I still had the mental advantage of knowing where I was.  We started the race a bit fast, as I usually do, but we settled down a bit.  I took this picture of my friend Peter (Erin actually used his bib, there was all sorts of bib exchanging going on!) while running.  Yes, if I am taking pictures while running, I am taking it easy, right?  That is what I told Erin when she got stressed about how fast we were going. 

The hills weren't too bad, and it felt great on the downhills.  This picture was my favorite, and was taken around mile 8 or so.

I finished with a time of 1:20:08, which was only 8 seconds over my goal time of 8min/mile!  I think my Garmin had me at under 8, since I did a bit of zig-zagging to get water and didn't always take the shortest turns.  Erin was so happy to PR!  I didn't realize it at the time, but I really pushed her!  It was so rewarding to know that I helped her do this! 

Here we are post race.  Chris, Jen's husband, did pretty well.  It was his first race of the year, and had to dash off to coach his son's soccer game.  I also realized after getting home that my other neighbor, John, had raced and he was pleased with his time, despite a slight injury.  He is speedy, and finished in 1:05! 

In other news, I am having a tough time with Ryan's work schedule, and being 100% responsible for the kids on the weekdays.  Ryan's work has kept him there until 7pm on most days, and when it doesn't, he is trying to get in a ride.  The hardest thing is that I don't want him to not ride, I just wish he didn't have to work these hours!  I miss him terribly.  We are both so tired by the time he is home that it is hard to enjoy the time together.  My church responsibilities just increased, and it is killing me.  Twice now, I have been reduced to tears over teaching my lesson that I have a meeting tonight to try to reduce it.  I don't think they really know how much I am struggling with the kids.  I don't feel like I am naturally maternal, and with both kids not napping, I just don't get any time to do anything without the threat or actual interuptions.  It drives me nuts, and I have just been really tense.  Hopefully there will be an end in sight to Ryan's hours, and I can get some help.  Ryan has worked like this before, but Keira hasn't been in school, so I could just go where ever I needed to go to have more help.  I can't pull her out of school to go to my parent's because I am too stressed here without Ryan.  Pretty much last summer, I felt it was easier to play the single parent in MI because I had family and more friends to help out. I had Ryan's mom who loved to have them, especially because she knew we were leaving and had to get in as much time as possible, and Valerie who's husband would watch all our kids so that we could ride together.  How awesome was that? I have a few people that can watch the kids, but since they are newer friends, I feel like I need to reciprocate, and am not fully comfortable with completely falling apart in front of them like I need to.  Watching too many kids over here just makes it worse, and Ryan hates coming home to a really messy house.  Unfortunately, I am a total failure at being able to have fun with the kids and put dinner on the table while maintaining even a tidy house.  Not even clean.  There is construction paper ALL OVER the living room floor right now, but the kids aren't bothering me so I can have a little bit of peace and quiet, so I don't care.  Ryan will, though, so once he calls, we'll try to clean it up.  I am thankful for my new running friends, because at least now I feel like I can go to a race without being alone.