Royal Tracs 5k

Julie ran a race! Now, I know what you are thinking:

Oh, that must have impacted Charlie's weekend! I'm enthusiastic to hear the thrilling tale of not running the race.

          - No One Ever

Thank you for asking. It was quite an ordeal.

I became aware that she was running a 5k this weekend at about 7:15 Saturday morning when I was rousted out of bed with comments like, "I'm going to the race." and "I've been telling you about this several times a day for the last week."

Because I am a super hero, I was able to find pants, find Greg, feed Greg, find Greg's pants, verify that I was still wearing pants, and - to summarize my achievements - I got Greg and I both to the race AND we were wearing pants. Correctly. It's a good thing I remembered pants because it was really cold and windy.

I should mention that finding the race was not trivial. Julie muttered something about a "Northview" park that meant absolutely nothing to me. I just knew that it was East of our house. Somewhere. Presumably with a view to the North. After some driving, I got close enough that I could see runners and then spent the next five minutes following the right-hand curb through a labyrinthine neighborhood. I was far too proud to take 2 seconds to glance at the Google maps on my phone.

After a quarter mile stroller hike across a field, I arrived just in time to take this picture:

10 seconds before finishing.

And moments later:

There's always somebody in front of the clock.

Had there been a crowd, the next moments would have seen me go full werewolf as I clawed my way through the pressing throng to re-unite my family. However, in this case, there was no crowd. Julie wandered over and I handed her our little dude.

Greg is experimenting with different looks to use with his new hat.

The moment you see in the photo above was apparently mind bending for at least two runners who later stopped Julie to express their amazement at discovering her mom-ness after witnessing her fastness. She has a sense for these things and after posing for just the right amount of time to maximize the intimidation, she handed off Greg and went for a cool down run.

I told Greg he could push his own stroller back to the car.

Post-race, we waited in the cold and windy for about 45 minutes before they began the awards ceremony. Some of the staff must have been new to the game because they were absolutely baffled that some of the age group winners did not stick around to collect their hardware.

Julie collects her hardware. Because she's a pro.

Julie got first woman overall and then we all got some Chinese food.



Comments

Mickey said…
19:2x is pretty impressive in the wind AND the cold! Great job, Julie!! :-) Awesome sports-writing! What's the background story on the race: "Royal Tracs"???
Julie's trophy was inscribed "Royal Tracs 5K 2013". Now you know everything I know.
4 is More said…
Dad - I think it is a fundraiser for Royal Family Kids, which is a camp for foster kids.
Anonymous said…
Great race, Julie!! Very fast!! Impressive time. Very enjoyable blog, Charlie!

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