Race Report: That dream where you're naked

Short report:
1st woman
6th person (!)
Course record by 2:15
Final Time: 40:12

This race report will read much like last week's except I was sicker, slower and more naked (nakeder?). Hubby continues to be out of town so I hired Ivy to come with me to another race as my mother's day treat to myself. When I woke up on race morning, I was clearly sick but I had spent an hour the day before packing the car for race morning/swim lessons/trip to park/nuclear Armageddon and there was no way I was going to waste that burst of organization.

Getting to the race site was unexpectedly challenging as construction made the directions on the website irrelevant. We parked the car 30 minutes before the gun. By the time we got la cocotte and Squeaker into the school and I picked up my number, I had 12 minutes to warm-up which I used to the utmost. I felt flat, tired and hungry. In fact I felt like I had already run a race. Definitely sick. But I still felt my goals, course record (begging to be broken at 42:20) and age category win for the series points were do-able. I decided on a final pee in the woods prior to the start, had technical difficulties (we'll leave it at that) and found myself sprinting to the start line with 30 seconds to spare... expect it was actually 15:30 to spare because race start was delayed.

The race was much like trying to do advanced calculus with a toddler trying to get one's attention. Divided resources. As in, part of my body was running 10 km and the other part was busy fighting off whatever creeping crud invaded our house in the past few days. I just felt exhausted. Not out of breath exhausted but I-could-lie-down-on-this-nice-suburban-lawn-and-fall-asleep exhausted. I ran a decent 5 km (19:38) and then started playing the game of... "even if I run 4:30 kms to the finish, I'll break the course record" and with every km that went by I was able to raise the per km pace that I could run and still break the course record (does anyone else do this??). At 8 km (32:02) I calculated I could run 5:08/km and still break the course record and felt pretty darn confident that I would get it, creeping crud and all.

So I closed off in 40:11, got my points for the series and the course record (still screaming to be broken). Rounded up the troops and got in the car to get to swim lesson; we should have had tons of time except... I turned out of the parking lot and immediately joined the long line of stationary cars trapped by the ongoing half marathon. Seriously? What is up with runners BLOCKING THE ROADS on a Sunday morning when I have somewhere to be???

Pulled up to the YMCA 5 minutes after swim lesson started, which is a big deal given the lesson only lasts 30 minutes and the instructor boots us out of the pool inexplicably 5 minutes early every time. I was feeling queasy with mother guilt knowing how much la cocotte was looking forward to swimming. We ran inside to the family locker room. Familiar with these? The idea is that a family can change together inside the large changing cubicles. It makes sense when hubby is with us. When he is not I could of course use the girls locker room but the force of habit and lateness propelled me towards the familiar. I ran inside, focused 100% on getting us into the pool ASAP, tore off my running clothes and started rooting for my swimsuit when I heard a tentative and embarrassed sounding "um... excuse me". Fathers. Fathers everywhere (the moms were presumably taking Mother's Day off). I further exacerbated the situation by dropping an "oh shit" in front of all the waiting toddlers. I grabbed la cocotte and ran into a change cubicle.

In the end the lesson actually started 15 minutes late so we did not miss a single minute of swimming. All in all a successful, if not somewhat exhausting and embarrassing morning.