Moonlight Madness 2013

Saturday night, I made the hasty decision to run the local Moonlight Madness race at Shasta Dam. I just happened to see an ad for it earlier in the day, and decided that I could race 2 miles no problem. Why not?

I've only done a handful of races in my time. I've done the annual Turkey Trot a couple times and San Francisco's Bay to Breakers once, but they don't total anything near 42.0 races. I don't run a marathon every weekend. Ain't nobody (especially this lady) got time for dat!

I went on my own, since Mike didn't really want to go, so he stayed at home with the baby. I didn't see anyone that I knew, so I spent some time before the race walking around and checking out the view. The last time I was at Shasta Dam was when I was a kid, so it's been a while! The scenery was pretty and the sunset was gorgeous.

That's a nest up at the top of the pole!

It was my first race after having little miss J in January (actually, my first race since November of 2011, heh) so I'm a little rusty at the racing and pacing thing. So it's no surprise that I went out way too hard. However, I shocked myself by completing the two miles in 16:19. That's right. I maintained a stellar (for me!) pace of 8:10 min/mi. I put in a really hard effort and was spent at the end, but I was really surprised by the clock when I crossed the finish line.

My "training" has been lackluster and sporadic at best and non-existent at worst. You can see for yourself on dailymile! I do a lot of stroller walking on my days off, try to wake up early enough to run/walk on the treadmill (which hasn't happened for two weeks now, ha), and during my shifts at work usually cover 10 miles a day, so I guess it's helped my cardiovascular system more than I thought. Anyway, it was great! A+ will run again.

Super thrilled after the race.