November 15, 2009

The Pub Relay

Got up this morning feeling a little groggy. Had some yogurt for breakfast and that was it.

The temp was about 3C (37F), overcast, slight wind with a forecast for strong winds and snow flurries later in the day so I bundled up warm and took along some extra clothes as well. We met the team at Duffer's pub and shivered in the cold waiting for things to get rolling. Most of the teams were dressed up in funny costumes so we decided that next year we will definitely have to come up with something good! There were 20 teams of 6 people - always a sell out!

Once the first set of runners left, we drove up and met them at the first pub. After our runner arrived, and drank his beer, our next runner left on her leg. My leg was #4 and I had a flat, 5.1 km run along a busy street. I took off a little fast at first and my heart rate was flying. I tried alternating forefoot and heel strike but eventually just focussed on running to get 'er done.

At the 2.5 km mark, I was running about a 5:30 km (8:51 mile) and Ik new that was too fast to maintain for the whole race so I slowed it down a bit. Also, my ITB started to tighten up and I really didn't want it to lock so I stopped and walked for about 20 seconds. I wasn't wearing my HR monitor but I could tell my HR was way up there in the race zone (170-180?).

At the 5 km mark, I was at 29:47 which is significantly faster than any 5k I've run all year. It's by no means a PR but it's a HUGE improvement considering I was trying to hold back a little. I arrives at the pub in 30:24 and chugged down my beer in about 5 seconds. None of this sippy junior stuff that my 30-something team mates were pulling off. LOL...

To be honest, the beer was different at each pub - it was all draft but some had been pulled earlier and was flatter so easier to drink. The glass sizes varied a little to.

They added a few things into the race that I didn't know about. The team in the lead at the 2nd leg had to carry a big brick the rest of the way and if you passed the brick holder, you had to take the brick too.

At the end of the 5th leg, the 5th runner and the 6th runner who was just leaving, BOTH had to drink a beer. In this case it was Erik. Luckily, he has a cast iron stomach and run on a full stomach of beer. I don't know if I could do that.... Then he had to drink another beer at the end.

This is the final run for the Kelowna Running Club and there were a lot of well known, very fast serious runners there. Our team probably came in about 12-14th (out of 20) I think. There were no prizes for placing, only for best costumes and lots of door prizes, plus a huge buffet and of course, another beer.

Anyway, it was a ton of fun and we'll definitely do it again next year!