Go, you chicken fat, go away!

Since my wife and I started our diet she has told me that we should do a 5k at least once a month.  I held her to it this month, and we did the 22 too Many 5k.  This race is organized  by local race director Shawn Chambers and his Run Your Race AZ.  Shawn does a lot of good for our veterans.  I really enjoy his events because the people that come are genuine and good people.  22 is the number of veterans that take their own lives each day mostly due to PTSD.

We got up early and discovered that it was raining outside.  It rained on us all the way to the event and then stopped right when we got there.  I saw a couple of my friends including Andre, Kim, and Sarah.  There were 317 participants in the race and the chute is pretty narrow.  They told everyone that the competitive runners should start at the first taped off area and the walkers/stroller pushers/ dog owners should start at the next taped off area.  My wife and I lined up right at the front of the 2nd taped off area right behind Kim.  The race started and it took a while before I could even get running due to the crowd.  The first thing you do is take an immediate right and run half a mile.  I stayed right behind Kim and Andre wanting to catch up, but having no intention of pushing it.  When we made the turn around the corner, somehow they both got way in front of me.  I started running back and saw my wife.  After a while I saw Kim stop and start to walk.  I patted her on the back and encouraged her.  She started running again and stayed with me for a bit.  We kept running down the path until we made another 180 turn around another set of cones.  Then we ran back to the start/finish line.  On the way back I saw a dead scorpion on the path.

I picked up the pace the last half mile.  It's an interesting dynamic when you purposely run slow.  All the people you are running with are not that fast and can't maintain the pace they started at.  So you really don't get passed at all.  When I finished I got my medal, caught my breath, picked up an American flag that someone had dropped, and headed back out to meet my wife.  I found her at the scorpion.  She had run the entire way, which was great for her.  We stayed for the award ceremony and the raffle, but we didn't win anything.  Afterwards, we were going to have lunch with Andre, Kim, and Sarah, but on the way there our grandson's mother called to see if we could pick him up.  I forgot to say that Andre had started at 3am because for the last three years he runs 19 miles in advance and runs the remaining 3 with us so that he can have 22.