Jennifer Tinney 5 Mile Road Race - July 4th

Official Results: 2nd OA, 1st AG M30-39, Time:29:21 (5:43/mile)

It's been awhile since I've posted to my blog, about 8 months to be exact. The truth is I haven't had the time to post and with our wedding coming up in a couple of months my training and racing this year has taken a back seat and to be honest it has been great not being tied into a regimented training/racing schedule and stressing myself out on not meeting my training goals. However, I do miss the competitiveness of racing!

Well, despite my lack of training I have decided to do a least a few races this year and one of them was the Jennifer Tinney 5 Miler in Boxford, MA. I found out about it searching on coolrunning.com for a race to do on the 4th of July that was close enough to home. I also thought that it was a great cause since the money from the race went towards a scholarship setup at one of the local high schools in Jennifer Tinney's name. This race was perfect! Needless to say I looked at the previous years results to see how I might far against my possible competition and it looked like I had a shot at the top 10.

Race day was warm and humid! Jess and I got there early so I could check in and warm up. After a descent warm up and stretching session it was time to line up! Once the gun was off the adrenaline was pumping, but I thought to myself I know I won't have much left a the end so I shouldn't go out to hard...I tried to back off a little, but I still came through Mile 1 at 5:34..too fast! I was in second place the entire race and I ended up losing sight of the race leader after the 2nd mile, so I mostly on my own for rest of the race. The good thing was that a few weeks prior to the race I ran the course so that I knew where it went in case this happened.

Overall the race went well! I was surely surprised to take 2nd place overall and win my new Age group M 30-39! It was awesome! After I came through the finish line I ended up being interviewed by the local newspaper, The Eagle Tribune and come to find out I ended up in there with 2 photos, 1 of everyone lined up at the start and 1 of me coming down to the finish line. Here is a link to the article.
http://www.eagletribune.com/sports/x1435411517/North-Andover-10-year-old-dazzles-at-Tinney-5-mile-race/print

Up next Call to Honor Triathlon on September 11th. Hopefully, I can make a descent showing again at this race! Wish me luck!