Thanksgiving morning I ran in my second Fast Freddie 5-miler. What made this one so special was that my daughter, Jade, had decided to run it with me. How cool is that?
The day started off pretty early for me. Tom, Shawna, and I had planned on meeting at 6 am to put in a few miles before the race. Mainly because Shawna was going to her families house near Indy and couldn’t join us and I was running with my daughter, so I wasn’t going to be pushing too hard. But unfortunately the weather did not cooperate. About 5:30 am I received a text from Shawna and she had been watching the weather. She said that we were getting ready to get hit by a storm any minute. So we scrapped the early run.
After that I just kind of checked out blogger and Facebook to kill time before heading out to pick up everyone and head to the run.
Before I knew it I needed to get ready. I had told Tom that I would pick him up at about 8 and then head to pick up Chris. Which is just how it played out.
By 8:30 we were at the 4-H fairground. Unfortunately it had started raining just after 7, so where we had to park we ended up walking through puddles of water. I knew my feet would be wet once the race started, but I wanted to keep them dry as long as I could. No such luck. We headed inside and hung out until it was time to head out to the start.
Tom’s goal for this race was to beat his friend Traci. She had told him that she was going to beat him, but he wasn’t planning on letting that happen. Chris had never really said what his plan was, but I really didn’t expect him to stay with us. It really wouldn’t be fair to him.
As we walked out to the starting area everyone started to run! It wasn’t even time to start the race, so I have no clue what that was all about. By the time we did reach the starting area it was time to get things underway. I told Tom good luck as he headed towards the front of the pack. Chris stuck with us for about the first quarter mile and then was off.
I stayed with Jade for the entire race. She did great! The only time she needed to walk was almost 3 miles in, and that was just after climbing a decent hill. We only walked for a few minutes before she said she was ready to go. We never stopped again until we crossed the finish line. Tom came back and ran in some of the last half mile with us. He was so happy because he had beaten Traci! What made it even better was that Traci was receiving help from Garry and still couldn’t beat Tom. He beat them both. Chris was near the finish line and was awesome enough to take a few pics of us coming in. He even ran to the finish line and snapped a few there. Thanks Yeti!
I have to say that this was one of my proudest moments since I started running. It was really awesome to see Jade cross that finish line in front of me. Some people think they have to make a statement and beat there kids across the line. Not me. I think it shows so much more class to let them get that feeling of finishing a race, without having you tell them that you beat them. This run was not about me at all. It was all about Jade.
Chris had an awesome run as well. He was very close to his PR for that distance.
So that’s how I started off my Thanksgiving. I really hope it becomes a tradition.
Later
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