Today I am honored to introduce another guest race recap! My friend Andrea stroller-ran her kids through their first ever road race in her town’s Thanksgiving 5K, and she was kind enough to jot me up a post about it. Onward!
Thanks Jenn for inviting me to contribute to your fun running blog! I’ve never written a blog post before (okay, maybe on Myspace), and I haven’t run a race in about 20 years when I was on my high school’s cross country team.
This morning, in pouring rain, while pushing my two little boys in an unfamiliar running stroller that I borrowed from a friend, I did my local YMCA Thanksgiving Day 5K. Thanks a lot to the Y for advertising this race with googly-eyed turkeys all over the place including at the entrance to their child care room so my 3 year old was super keen on participating. He insisted, and I have a very hard time telling him no, especially if he’s asking to do something nice like a charity run.
We signed up weeks ago. When I saw the forecast a few days before the race, I tried to convince the little guy that we could spend Thanksgiving morning doing any number of other fun activities. But my efforts were futile. He was absolutely sure we needed to run the 5K and I didn’t want to break his heart. We made some not very tasty pancakes* and took off to go race. [Editor’s note: Non-tasty pancakes are virtually impossible. Andrea is an unreliable narrator!]
We arrived a little late because it’s very hard to get places on time with people who cannot put on their own shoes. I did my best to pin race bibs on wet sleepy toddlers and off we went, about 10 minutes after the race had officially begun. I’m counting that as a win in itself.
We still got there in time to run the race! The little guys were happily singing and cheering me on from their nice dry stroller capsule. I was not feeling it, but hearing their sweet little voices kept me going and was absolutely heartwarming. We actually caught up to some other racers despite our late start!
A friend of ours who works at the gym was at the first turn and I must admit I was feeling really proud of myself and was glad someone I knew saw us. Hah. This friend along with Jenn and the friend who loaned us the stroller have been instrumental in getting me back into running. Thanks so much friends. I feel 10x better than I did a year ago.
After about one mile, 3 year old asked when we would be finished. That’s when it struck me that he had no idea what he was asking to do when he convinced me to sign us up. What a fool I am.
We had to do some walking on hills and deep puddly areas, part of the course was around our local zoo and it smelled awful. Plus with all the rain my feet were soaked, but we made it back to the Y! When we got there the 3 year old then asked if that was the first lap. I think I have a future coach on my hands. I pulled the kids out of the stroller to cross the finish line on their own and it was so glorious.
We dried off inside and hung out for the winners announcement. We definitely did not qualify for any sort of prizes, but the very kind YMCA directors gave the kids medals anyway. They were so excited, and I was so proud. Mid-race I was thinking to myself I’d never do such a thing again, but now reflecting back, I think we will make this a Thanksgiving tradition.
Now I’m going to get all mushy and sappy. The whole affair has me reflecting on my first exposure to running as exercise vs just running to play tag or escape a bully. I was 11 and did a 5k called The Jingle Bell Run with my parents. It was a fundraiser for a rheumatoid arthritis charity and they did it every year, so I really wanted to join in on the run fun.
They gave out jingle bells to tie into your shoe laces. It must have been quite an obnoxious sound to hear all those runners with bells. My dad hung back with me the whole time and it was such a special experience for me. I have an awful memory but that one has always stuck. It was really cool for me to bring my kids over to my parents house this afternoon and tell them about our race. The boys had medals to show off and I had a great story.
Thanks again Jenn for having me write this all out. I’m really glad I did. Even if my memory gets all fuzzy in a few years I’ll be able to reread this!
Thank you Andrea!!! Stroller running sounds SO HARD, so color me impressed. I’m glad the boys enjoyed the experience; you’ll be signing them up for their first half marathon before you know it! And if you wanna runDisney, you know where to find me. 😜
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