too fun fun run

Saturday was the Sioux Falls St. Patty's Day 5 mile run, and it was so much fun!  5 of the Vermillion running ladies came to run the 5 mile race with me, and we all did great.  I had a personal best time, running sub-8 split times. Yay! Here is a picture of all of us.  I'd say we are a pretty good looking bunch of mommies!  I guess that's what running your butt off will do for you.  Incidentally, these ladies are also in the boot camp cycles, and so we see a lot of each other in the early hours of the morning.  I'm actually not sure if I would recognize them in street clothes.  Hmmm...

We all deserved either a medal or a hundred bucks each, because this course was TREACHEROUS!  We have seen record snowfalls and ice this year, and it just hasn't had a chance to melt all the way yet.  The course was on a bike path through the Falls park.  This is usually a very pretty run, but Saturday it was deadly.  Every bridge that we ran under either had an enormous sheet of thick ice over the path, or was totally submerged in water.  Both are not ideal running conditions, and it slowed everyone down quite a bit.  I managed to stay upright for the entire time, but I saw a few people slip on the ice and go down pretty hard.  I think maybe the organizers would have checked the course prior to the race and made some modifications, but no.  Or, and I don't even want to consider this...maybe they thought it would be okay to run on sheets of ice.  Although the race was chip timed, there was no clock at the finish, so runners did not have any idea what their times were when they ran in (rather upsetting for many). I cheated and had my nike+ on, but it is still nice to see that big clock when I run in.  Also, before the race we were yelled at by the police (who were at the race in full force) for standing in the road. Apparently the guy who was supposed to check the course for ice was also in charge of getting the roads closed for the race...because it, too, never got done.  We had to start the race with 300 runners crowding onto a bike path, lined up on either side of a truck and trailer that was blaring irish music.  I was all for the Irish music, but when it was in the way of the starting line...not the biggest fan.

After the race I enjoyed a couple of Killian's beers (hey...it's St. Patrick's Day! What do you expect?) and went home.  Sunday I woke up feeling terrible, and although I managed to make myself do an hour on the precor machine (cross-train day), I was not my best.  I tried to chalk it up to maybe overexerting myself in the race or getting too cold, as there was a nasty wind that morning. Monday was my rest day, and I was still quite tired, but blamed it on the miles I have been logging.  Tuesday morning's run came, and I could barely make it.  It was horrible.  I felt awful.  By this time I realized that I had been living with a headache and sinus pressure for the last few days, and had been battling a runny nose for the last two weeks.  I'm not really one to go running to the doctor, but with my training schedule the way it is now, I figured I had better get in.

Diagnosis: sinus infection.  Thank goodness!  That is probably why I have been feeling so tired!  Since this is my first marathon, I have no comparison to how one is supposed to feel, so I just kind of figured the exhaustion was normal.  It's not, and in 5 days when my Z pack is gone, I should have loads of energy.  And I'm gonna need them, because the heavy miles start on Saturday!