Guys, I had such a blonde moment on Saturday. Remember how I said my friend Turner and I were running the Clarendon Day 10k? Well, we ended up doing the 8 a.m. 5k instead of the 9 a.m. 10k by accident. I think what happened was that I completely forgot the races started at separate times, and on the race website it just says 8 a.m. start on the main landing page. In the pre-race email and elsewhere on the website it is super clear that are separate start times, so it was totally my fault. It seriously wasn’t until we were JUST about to finish the race that I realized my mistake. Fail! A good reminder to always double check the details. 🙂 We still had fun, though!
The 5k and 10k have the same start and finish areas so I didn’t realize anything was amiss when we lined up. It was a lovely morning for racing!
And we’re off! The first mile of both the 5k and 10k is basically all downhill – so nice.
We settled into a reasonably speedy but comfortable pace to maintain for 6 miles (if I knew we were doing a 5k, we would have picked it up!). I was feeling really good. I feel like I hadn’t done a race in ages – I did SO many this spring but didn’t really do much on the racing front since June! I really missed it! (Here are all my race recaps.)
Both of the races take you out on the highway, which isn’t the most beautiful, but it’s nice and flat, at least. The turnaround point was the first time where I was like… that’s weird, we turned around sooner than I remembered (the 10k goes out farther, and then loops back and ends in the same spot as the 5k). I also thought it was weird that I didn’t see Mary, who I knew was in town visiting and running the 10k, when we doubled back.
Finally, on our way back, we saw a sign that had “mile 3/6” on it, and I was like… omg. I asked the guy next to us: “Is this the 5k or the 10k?!?!” And he was like, “Umm, 5k?” Failllllllllllllllll
“Well, if this is the 5k, then let’s blow out this last 0.1 miles, at least!” Blurry finish line action shot:
I felt SO dumb for making such a silly mistake, but c’est la vie. Thankfully Turner was totally fine with doing a shorter race! I was mostly just mad because I was feeling really strong and wanted to see what time we could get! Bummer.
Splits:
- Mile 1: 7:56
- Mile 2: 7:35
- Mile 3: 8:04
- 0.1ish nubbin pace: 7:48
When we finished, I remembered that the “double dip” was an option – basically, you do the 5k, metro back up to Clarendon from Rosslyn, and run the 10k, too. Turner wasn’t feeling the double dip, but I was considering it, so we decided to metro back up to the start and see if that was an option (we needed to go back up there, anyway, to get our bags). I talked to the race officials and they were super nice about it and gave me a new bib, saying to just email them after to settle up the cost/make sure my times were correctly noted given the bib swap. But by the time we got back to the start line, I started to get hungry, which isn’t a good way to start a race, and I also didn’t want to ditch Turner for an hour, so at the end of the day I decided to bag it. Oh well!
We did find Mary in the corrals to say hello, though! She ended up setting a new PR – awesome! (My bib is different since that’s the new one they gave me when I was considering doubling up!) Move back, Mary! DC misses you!
Turner and I grabbed coffee and pastries and walked back down to the finish.
We missed seeing Mary finish, but found her and Sokphal hanging out. Mary headed off to meet some friends for brunch, and Sokphal joined me and Turner! We walked back up the hill into Clarendon and hit up Lyon Hall. Since I’d already checked my caffeine and carbs blocks for the morning, I went with eggs – a huge omelette with veggies and bacon. Yum!
When we were done, we walked around the Clarendon Day festival for about an hour checking out the vendors. Lots of cool stuff and pretty jewelry!
As for the rest of the day, it was so nice out Turner and I decided to rent stand up paddleboards from Key Bridge Boathouse.
Perfect day to be out on the water!
I was sad to say goodbye to Turner on Saturday night – she was in town for a conference on Thursday/Friday and stuck around to hang out an extra day. So good to have her here!
As for the rest of the weekend, Saturday night we had some burgers with friends, and on Sunday Matt and I took advantage of another gorgeous day with a bike ride! We biked about 25 miles total, heading out to Vienna and back along the Custis and W&OD trails. We stopped for lunch at the Vienna Whole Foods, which is right on the trail. This is Matt’s “This sandwich is the size of my head and I like it” face.
As for me, I went for a veggie explosion. Hit the spot!
We also shared this BluePrint juice – I love their stuff. Hadn’t had this one before – very tasty!
It was so fun to get out for a nice bike ride with Matt – it had been awhile since we’d done that and it’s one of my favorite ways to spend a beautiful day.
It’s Monday again – better get back to it. Hope you all enjoyed your weekends!
Anyone else race over the weekend? How did it go?
Have you ever totally flubbed the details like I did this weekend? 🙂
