I am such a nerd

I am seriously such a huge nerd. I've paid money in order to be able to get up while it's still dark out on several Saturday mornings and drive up to an hour away (often in the bitter cold) to run with a bunch of other crazy people in not quite adequate clothing. It's just like cross country and track in high school and college, except now I'm paying for it. Back then, I used to leave away messages on AIM that said, "I'm off running around a golf course/track in my underwear." Now I wear a bit more clothing than that, but it's generally less than is normal to go out in public in. Heh. Oh, runners. What's hilarious is that I still have my bunhuggers from college hanging in the closet, ready to whip out at a moment's notice. I'll probably never have the balls to wear them again.

I forgot to mention before, my 24:11 at the Frostbite 5K actually garnered 4th place in my age group, quite unexpectedly. I was nowhere near the 3rd place person time-wise, so it's not like I was close to getting an award, but still, that's pretty nifty. The rest of my races this spring will be far more competitive than this one, so I'd better enjoy that while I can. Even if I improve as much as I'm hoping to, I probably won't be placing that high in my age group until I run another small, local 5K.

Since I registered for the Louisville Triple Crown, the next race on the schedule is actually another 5K. So I suppose my goal of 23:00 will stand. My goal for the following 10K is 48:00, the time I need to qualify for Level 3 seeding at the mini. This seems more doable than the 21:40 needed for 5K. Hopefully the longer mileage I've been putting in so far this year will pay off in more endurance during these two 10Ks. The problem is that if I want to get the seeding, I'll have to get it in my first 10K; the deadline for seeding is that day. I think it's a realistic but challenging goal for the next few weeks. Last year I ran this race on subpar training in 49:49, so I should think being considerably faster than that is a given. Even if I don't get it, I'll still be in "preferred" seeding since I can run a half marathon under 2:30.