Carey's Playground

This run was to benefit The Center for Mental Retardation.  As a nice pick-me-up, halfway through the race, at Shepard and Allen Parkway where The Center is located, they had people living with mental retardation giving us water and cheering us on :)

 

When I got to three miles (which is the longest I had ever gotten before deciding to go home), I was just short of 36 minutes.  I realized that if I could just keep the same pace, I could finish in under an hour.  When I got to the 4-mile mark, the guy calling the numbers said "fourty-eight!" and I looked at him and said out loud: "YES!"  It kind of took him off guard and he smiled and told me I was doing great :)

 

Overall, I don't feel too bad today.  Pretty much every muscle below my knee hurts because there were some ups and downs I wasn't used to (there were two spots on Allen Parkway where the road dips 15 feet under another road).  In Houston, I'm not used to ANY change in elevation.  It's rather flat here.

 

In the end, I'm glad I showed up and did well.  Next step is to find a 10k (6.2 miles) to run, then a 15k (9.3 miles), then the Houston half-marathon in January (13.1 miles, my ultimate goal)