Packet pickup was at Sports Authority on Clark St just a few blocks from my apartment. Score! T-shirt is a long sleeve orange tech shirt, but it's men's size and it's huge so I'll never wear it.
The race started at 9 a.m. all the way down at McCormick Place. On site parking was $21 bucks so I took the train!
I decided to make an oatmeal smoothie for breakfast: quick oats, almond butter, cinnamon, banana and water. I would have used milk but I didn't have any :( I made so much that it ended up being a recovery smoothie as well! I don't know how much I like the oatmeal smoothies though. Maybe I shouldn't have added almond butter?
Anyways, the race!
I wasn't sure what to expect, I have never run an indoor 5K nor have I ever been to McCormick place. This was the first time I had to use gear check because duh! we were indoors and obviously I didn't need my long winter coat on! I had to wait in line to check my bag but it went pretty quickly and before I knew it they were calling us to move towards the start.
I was in a bit of a panic because with the hour long train ride I REALLY NEEDED TO PEE!!! With less than 15 minutes until the start of the race I figured I was screwed! Well imagine my surprise when I walked into the bathroom and there was no line! Awesome! I think there were a ton of restrooms around McCormick Place and this really helped as I didn't have to wait in line after the race either!
I decided to line up with 10:00 pace corral. Just a few months ago this would have seemed overly ambitious and maybe my PR of 29:08 was a fluke but I really wanted to run 10 minute miles! Each pace group was sent off in 2 minute intervals. Basically the entire 2.1 miles was set up between two big rooms. This meant a lot of twists and turns but it was cool because you literally always were in view of a bunch of other runners. In fact when I got to the 2nd room the first few runners were crossing the finish line and I got to see it!
The twists and turns probably slowed me down a bit as it was hard to maneuver the turns and not run into the other people that were also turning. For the most part I was never running alone as there were others running around my same pace as well as the others that were still zig-zagging through the course.
This was the first 5K I ran that didn't make me feel awful and since I didn't have my GPS I never really knew exactly how I was doing. I didn't end up beating my PR from New Year's Eve but I'm quite happy with how I did.
At the finish line there were a ton of free samples as well as bananas and bottles of water. I drank a bit of water and then stuffed the rest in my bag. I don't usually eat protein bars but I'm kind of excited to try the Cookie Dough Performance Energy Bar!
THE RESULTS:
Finish Time: 29:57
Pace: 9:40
Overall: 491/1438
Age Group: 33/153
Yay for a great race and a new PR! An indoor race in January sounds awesome - it must have been so nice to not have to worry about the elements at all. But McCormick Place can certainly be frustrating to navigate through and to get to since it's SO HUGE. I can imagine the twists and turns must have been awkward, too. I ran the Strike Out ALS 5K last summer, where part of it takes place inside of US Cellular Field - and the indoor running was more challenging than anticipated!
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