Dawn on the Run

Heh, did you see Monday’s paper? Okay so my photo didn’t make it to the local paper (Calgary Herald) but there’s a cool shot of Nikayla doing her little warm up dance before the race that made the papers.

It kind of looks like this shot that I took.

And heh, there’s a blurb in there about me & the family and why we do the race.

Nikayla Hopkins, 6, came with her mom and grandma. All three generations were dressed in head-to-toe pink — Nikayla ’s fluorescent pink feather boa the icing on her ensemble.

This is the fourth year Nikayla and her family participated in the fundraiser. Last year, the young runner beat her personal best in the five-kilometre race with a time of 39 minutes and 30 seconds.

“It’s nice to be able to do something all together and it’s become a tradition for us,” said Nikayla ’s grandma, Dawn Henry.

You can read the rest of the article over here.

It’s been yet another busy week and an even busier day. I’ll keep this brief and do a longer report later in the week with lots of photos.

For now I’ll keep it short. We had an awesome Mother’s Day race today. Oh yeah, HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY to all the Moms out there. Anyhow we had a blast while the results weren’t quite as good as last year they are still awesome.

• Nikayla 40:21 (little 6 yr old)
• Carrie 40:23 (her Mom)
• Dawn 45:52 (me, pinkchick, slow old fart…lol)

I have a ton of photos as usual but have run out of time today. I will try to get them up later in the week. So how did you celebrate Mother’s Day?

Race Results - 5k
Race Results - 10k

You think I’m kidding but the weatherman announced a major snowfall warning for tonight in Calgary. Hmmmf. Oh well at least Monday was a good night for our run club. We had a great presentation from our pacer, who also just happens to be not only a Chiropractor with Kinetic Health, but a personal trainer. We did our group run first and Tarveen demonstrated some excellent stretches for after. She demonstrated everything you ever wanted to know you could do with one of those foam rollers. And here I thought they were only for IT Band issues.

Wednesday we somehow managed to time things well. It had been a rainy day but stopped for our run and didn’t downpour again until much later that evening. Yeah! We had a good run and later I had “coffee” with some of the members from my previous clinic. Today I even had lunch with Leah from my previous clinic. It’s great to have made some new running friends. So have you made any new running buddies lately?

As for the rest of the week. No more running planned until Saturday. Saturday I’ll be pacing for another group and then off to the Fitness Fair for my race this weekend. Oh yeah on Sunday my daughter, little Nikayla and I are off to yet again run the Mother’s Day 5k. This will be our 4th year doing the event. I likely won’t do as well as last year but it would be nice to beat my time from the Police 5k.

So today my group had a new pacer. My favorite little pink runner led the group and what a great job. Today’s workout was 4 sets of run5/walk1. It was a beautiful warm day for the workout and everyone did awesome. They say a picture is worth a thousand words so I’ll save mine and let the photos tell the story.

Nikayla really enjoyed the workout and commented to me that they were all really nice ladies. She was happy to meet and run with them. I might just have to bring her out again. The group ran between 3 and 3.5km depending on how many times they looped back for the balance of the group. After the run, I rewarded Nikayla with a hot chocolate and a donut over at Tim Horton’s. Tomorrow the group moves to 6 and 1.

Found this in the liquor store Friday and couldn’t resist buying a bottle to sample while relaxing in the hot tub later. Very nice and very fitting.

The walkway was originally built in 1901 and now serves as an approach to the Makinodromo, the famous climbing sector of El Chorro(Spain). I found the video over at Brightcove. It’s fascinating, beautiful scenery but not a walkway I’d be brave enough to follow. I’m much too afraid of heights.

Well it was weather wise anyhow. For me well it was just so so. I spent most of the week tired and a bit achy for a variety of reasons. The race on Sunday was good but it did leave me a tad achy from the running and from standing around watching the last of the half marathon finishers. As if I wasn’t already tired enough, I must be a glutton for punishment as I was right back at it on Monday night. Yup it was yet another clinic night.

For clinic night we had a guest speaker from the local police station. The officer chatted with my group about safety. He gave some great tips. Now they are likely items I could easily of covered but I liked the idea of having a police officer deliver them for us and he was able one bit of informaton that I would not have - if there were areas near where we lived where running had been or could be unsafe from those “bad guys” that like to lurk around. Luckily the area we live in and run in is pretty safe.

After the chat we did the usual run around the lake. This week the workout is 4 sets of run 5 & walk 1. I let the group run without looping back on Monday so some of the gang managed to get in 4.5k (that included a few extra minutes of walking). The balance of the group did just over 3km. Everyone did great.

Tuesday I spent the evening finishing off our taxes. It didn’t take that long to do them but uploading them via “NetFile” proved to be a nightmare! Apparantly the servers were overloaded and well it took for ever to load the pages I needed. Actually the one I needed did not load until the next morning…grrrr. Even then it still didn’t work. I gave up and went to the office. I think I got about 4 hours sleep that night.

Wednesday when I got home I tried once again to “NetFile” our taxes and was amazed. It took all of 5 minutes to transmit both of our returns. Darren gets a refund but I owed so I also went online and paid my small balance owing. Then it was rush rush to get ready to head out the door. Yup, once again I’m off and running.

At the store it was great to see a large number of my last group there and planning to get a good run in. One of them leaned over and told me if I led a 10k group in the fall they’d all sign up with me. What an awesome thing to say. For my current group we had a group of 10 for the run. It was a nice warm evening so I’m not sure where the other half of the group was. Oh well, we did the usual around the lake but this time I had the group loop back so we stayed closer together. Seems this group likes to stick to running around the lake. One member said it made her feel like she was running by the ocean. My legs felt like led and I had trouble keeping up but managed to complete the workout.

Today I had my physio appointment with Ian. He worked my legs over pretty good and they feel much better tonight. He did something new today - it was a combo of accupuncture and electrical therapy. Felt weird but seems to have done the trick. Well that’s it for another week. So how goes it with you?

Sunday was an early morning. My race, the Calgary Police 5k, wasn’t starting starting until 8:30am but the half marathon was strting at 8:00am. I wanted to find good parking and see the start of the half so getting there early was important. Of course that meant getting up at about 5:50am in order to be ready to head out the door just after 6:30am. I didn’t need too long to get ready as I had layed everything out the night before. Also as I wasn’t running until 8:30 I decided I would eat a breakfast bar on my way to the race. I didn’t want to eat too early.

It was a gorgeous morning but still chilly so I opted to wear a long sleeve shirt under my tank top. It was likely I’d remove it during the race but no sense in getting a chill before the race. I arrived in plenty of time and while the place was busy I still found a great parking spot. I love the excitement of heading to a race. Runners milling about, stretching, chatting, warming up, eating and all the rituals we do before a race.

I milled about myself and visited with many of my friends. I even chatted with a few of the officer volunteers. They were surpized and even a tad disappointed that I was only doing the 5k. They had enjoyed following along in the race with me in past years. That was nice to hear. I too was feeling sad that I was doing the 5k instead of the half. The half on this race is one of my favs and I would miss out on seeing Karen as she was cheering on the last hill of the half.

Oh well, I had to be smart about things. The leg is doing great but pushing it to do a half would not be wise. After visiting with friends and hitting the bathroom I headed out to watch the start of the half. I wished all my friends luck and snapped a ton of photos as the runners lined up, then even more as they headed out. By the way, all those photos are over at my Flickr site, way too many to put in here…lol.

There were some technical delays to the half so id didn’t leave me much time for another quick bathroom trip. Thankfully no lineups and then it was back outside to lineup for my race. The 5k is not chip timed and no official time so wanting to time myself accurately I lined up a little closer to the front then I normally would have. Thankfully I had my Garmin with me to track things and while no official results will ever be posted, I will have my own time.

And then we were off & running. Starting out near the front meant being passed by lots and lots of runners. But heh, I’m used to that so it really doesn’t bother me. Heck about 4 or 5 strollers passed me early on that can be a bit disheartening. Doe it bug you?

The 5k route is pretty much all through residential areas. For the most part it’s pretty flat except for a few highway overpasses. Not my favorite kind of route. I prefere a few more hills - up & down of course. I know that sounds strange but flat just doesn’t give me the same momentum. I started out a tad fast finishing my first km in 7:45. Now it would of been nice if I could have kept up that pace, but well, no such luck. At the half way mark I was still doing good but had slowed down and got even slower from there. Oh well, at least there were still runners behind me.

I stuck to sets of running 9 and walking for 1 minute. That felt comfortable even though my sets with my running group had not been that long. As I finished each km I checked my pace and time. I had to remind myself that this was not a PR race, it was to set the bar for the year. My only real goal was not to have a PW (personal worst). My personal worst for a 5k was 47:58 so I had lots of room.

At the last km I picked it up where I could but found it tough. However, I had lots left in the tank when I saw the finish line and kicked in my sprint. Mr V shows my pace was about 4:38/km. Hmmm that made for a nice finish but perhaps it also meant I did leave enough of me out on the course.

Mr V tells his story here.

My final time 46:58. I had hoped for 45 but heh, I’ll settle for that. I hung out at the finish after taking tons of photos of the half marathon finishers. I stayed until the very last runner was done. Many a runner had waited for me in the past, this time it was my turn to see the last runners finish.

My Flickr Photos
Calgary Roadrunner photos
Race Results - Half Marathon

The weather man decided to grant my wish so I no longer have to chant “snow, snow, go away…”. Yes it did snow, a few flakes here and there during the rest of the week but it warmed up to a very balmy weekend. But heh, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Wednesday
Wednesday was clinic night and before heading out Donna gave movie passes to runners who had run in the nasty weather on Sunday. I scored one for me as did a few from my group.

The pathway was much clearer, no ice but it was still a tad narrow in some spots. We had a good run continuing with sets of run 4/walk 1. To get in a little extra workout I had jogged there and also did the same to get home. The run there had been mostly downhill so I did it in sets of about 7run/1walk. Even though it was uphill, I did about the same going home. Adding up all three distances I put in about 5.39kms of running and walking. It felt good. It was also a good test to see if I felt ready for my race on Sunday.

Thursday
Thursday I tried to round up someone to go to the movie, “Made of Honor” with me but no luck. It was a chick flick and hubby wasn’t about to miss a Montreal hockey game for a movie, let alone a “chick flick”. Fine, I went alone but met up with some other runners and sat with them. I really enjoyed the movie. Lots of laughs and a happy ending.

Friday
Thank goodness for Fridays! Friday was a good day and ended with an after work social. I did indulge in some of the appys available but gave away my drink tickets. I opted to not drink as I had too much to do on Saturday. I called it an early evening and headed home.

Saturday
I slept in only a tiny bit as I head to head out for an easy run. Oh yeah, Janice, who has been pacing for me in my clinic started her own clinic on Saturday and I agreed to pace for her. Yeah that means an extra day of running for me but it’s still only 4 days and heh, her clinic is starting over at run 1/ walk 2 so it will be an easy workout…for now. Anyhow, I ran with Janice’s group and did a nice easy pace. Heck we only did about 2kms so it was a good run to work out any kinks before my race on Sunday.

After the run I showered and changed. I then headed out to do a little retail therapy. I found a few things for me and also picked up some things for my daughter and Nikayla. I dropped by their place after for a short visit.

I spent the rest of the day laying out my stuff for Sunday’s race. Heck I even painted my toenails as painted toenails are more aerodynamic, right? Ready to run I went to bed early.

Snow Snow, go away
Come again another day….

I’m rewriting that old rhyme…lol. Acutally we don’t want it to come again another day. I’ve had enough already but still the flakes fall. I feel for poor Mark as up in Edmonton they got it even worse yesterday. Oh well despite the cold and the snow I did manage to go for my run last night.

A good sized group showed up for the clinic but a few bodies were missing. We started the evening with a guest speaker, Ian. He’s the physio guy that’s been fixing up my leg. He did a great chat about running, injuries and so much more. The group really enjoyed his talk. As the weather wasn’t the best I let him go on for a tad longer then the usual so we were a bit late getting out for our run.

Due to the icy conditions it was my recommendation that the group slow their pace. We were to do 4 sets of run 4 and walk 1. On the run set anyone not comfortable running on the icy path was allowed to slow it down or do a brisk walk. I didn’t want any injuries. Thankfully it was warmer then Sunday and there was no wind. It wasn’t even as icy as we thought it would be so we managed to get in all our sets without anyone falling. We didn’t quite get in our usual distance but ya know, that just didn’t matter. It was still a great workout.

High-5 runners for a job well done.