Strawberry Festival 10K

This morning Ryan and I ran in the Vista Strawberry Festival 10K. It was Ryan's first 10K (and longest run to-date). We were planning on using it for his proof of time for the Disneyland Half Marathon (If you don't submit a roof of time, they just stick you in the last corral, which means a lot of weaving and probably not a super stellar time. You have to have proof of a finishing time of a distance of 10K or further [that way they know you can sustain the pace for a while] so we figured this would be perfect.). We ran this race last year, but the 5K distance. This year was the first year they added the 10K, which was nice.

We have been running 6 miles for the past 4 weeks and doing it right around 62-65 minutes. I told Ryan we could try to push it and break an hour (which would be faster than we were doing 6 miles at AND adding an extra .2 miles). He said he wanted to go for it, so we gave it our best shot.

Honestly, if we would have known the course, I think we might have been able to prepare a little better. Mile 3 was about .75 miles UPHILL. We were keeping a decent pace, but I have been sick for the last two or so days, and I just could NOT breath. Ryan powered through it though!

We ended up just missing an hour by a few seconds (Ryan by 13 seconds and me by 17 [his kick at the end was better than mine due to his legs being twice as long as mine :) ]). I think if the hills wouldn't have been in there we would have definitely made it - but hey, it made us stronger! Even though we didn't make the goal, we still ROCKED IT! It was the fastest Ryan has ran and the longest distance. This will DEFINITELY move him up a few corrals for the DL Half (and make that race much more enjoyable).

We brought Walt with us, since we knew the festival was going on afterwards and we could walk him around to the different booths and vendors. Also, we got a free Mother Earth Brewing Co beer with our race, so we figured he could come hang out in the beer garden with us after we ran.

Afterwards we went and got donuts (I told Ryan it was 'his day' since he finished his big race) and ate them at the beach. Then Ryan took Walt down the slide...

And then when we got home, this is what happened (I think they were both a little wiped out).