Race Report - 2010 Cookie Dash 5K

Richard and I decided to make the local 5K race count as a training run for our upcoming Strolling Jim 40 Mile Run in two weeks. How did we do that, you ask? Well, we added a 14 mile warm up run to the start of the race. We met and my house at 4:45 AM and left from there to run a route Richard had worked out the day before. We would basically be able to run anywhere between 14 to 17 miles prior to the race and shorten it, if we needed or wanted to. We ended up running 14 miles to the start of the race. We had perfect running weather with temps in the upper 50s when we left my house. My legs felt a little heavy early on from this week's mileage. We cruised at a comfortable pace of just under 10 minutes per mile. Since I wasn't going to race the 5K for a PR, I opted to pace my fiancee to reach her personal best and it worked. Once we reached the finish, we enjoyed the largest selection of cookies I have ever seen. There must have been at least over 50 different cookies to choose from. A nice way to refuel after a long training run. This run also gave me the opportunity to try out the new Nathan 2 liter hydration vest I recently purchased and had yet to try out and review. You can read details about my experience in the gear review I will post on this blog. There are only two weeks left until the Strolling Jim 40 Mile Run, an ultra marathon road race in Southern Tennessee, just about an hour north of Huntsville. I'll shoot for another 50-60 mile week before tapering the last week prior to the race. The Strolling Jim will be my last training race prior to the 108K race I am running in Germany in early June.