Whew, it has been a looong but fun day! We signed up for the San Dimas Turkey Trot, 5k about a month ago when an Active.com deal gave us a great price. We had been wanting to do a trail run and this one was the closest and due to the deal, the cheapest. Score!
Our morning started off bright dark and early at 5:00 am. I got up to get my body moving but Jeff who is still getting over his cold, snoozed it a couple of times. Eventually he got up and decided he was going to run with me. He was borderline skipping since he has been coughing up a storm.
We headed down to the park around 6:00 am and had no problem parking. We walked down to the start line to pick up our bibs and goodie bags and then headed back to the car. At this time it was still pretty empty and really cold.
This race was my first with chip timing, pretty cool and more accurate than ripping off the bottom of your bib.
Wow…don’t we look tired?
About 30 minutes before start, we headed down to the race area but made a pit stop at the restrooms. When you register, the website encourages racers to dress up. As I was waiting in line, I saw a guy walk by in half a turkey costume. He looked hilarious!
It’s been awhile since I’ve actually been to Bonelli Park and it was so pretty.
We lined up a few minutes before 8:00 am, sang then National Anthem and then we were off!
The 5k-ers and 10k-ers both started together but almost immediately past the start, went our separate ways. The 10k-ers went right, outside the park and the 5k-ers went left around the lake.
The route started off pretty flat and with the nice view didn’t seem too bad. There were a lot of people passing Jeff and I in the beginning. I had to keep reminding myself that I needed to run my race at my pace.
About a half mile in, all of a sudden the road started to incline. Darn it! I picked another hilly race. (The hills weren’t that bad actually, but Jeff and I run on flat roads. We definitely need to work in hills to get used to them.)
I told myself to run as slow as I wanted up the hills and then coast on the downhill. I had to stop going up one of the more steeper hills but picked it back up after a few seconds.
At one point, the speedy runners had already made the turnaround and were passing us. The lead guy was hauling and I didn’t see another runner for a good 100 feet behind him.
Finally it was our turn to “turn around” and I knew we were half way done. Mentally that was nice to know.
On the way back, the course had us going a little further out from the lake. It appeared we were on the 10k route for a bit as we came up on mile 5. I actually questioned Jeff if we went the right way.
Towards the end of the run, my breathing was getting tough. My chest felt tight and I was a bit disappointed that I couldn’t hang with the hills. The end finally came into sight and I was so happy.
Jeff and I pushed it hard towards the end and as we came up to the clock, it was 34:48! I knew I’d need to check my chip timing later, but if my official time had a 34 in front of it, I knew I just PR’d!!
As soon as we finished, they snipped off our timing tags and handed us our turkey medals. They had lots of goodies which included coconut water, pumpkin pie, bananas, water and energy drinks. We grabbed some grub and sat down to rest and snack.
We finished our food and then headed back to the car for a real breakfast. Below is a close up of the medal we got. Cute.
And the goodie bag & t-shirt. It was pretty good for it being such a small race.
And now for the official results…I guess the chip timing makes it really fast.
Jeff finished in 34:27 and I finished in 34:28 – a PR by almost 2 full minutes!!
Jeff finished 8 of 16 in his age division, 53 male of 86 and overall 114/216. Pretty good!
I finished 10 of 18 in my age division, 62 female of 129 and overall 115/216.
Overall this was a great run. I liked that it was small and it was super organized. The views on the course were nice and it gives a good challenge with its rolling hills. This is one race that I would think about doing again next year!
