Cocoa 5-K

The changeable weather has changed again.  We took a look at the forecast last night, which called for a temperature of 33 degrees and a brisk 15-mph wind on Saturday morning, and decided that it was just not worth it to run a 5-K in conditions like that; both of us have run marathons in colder temperatures and in rain, but this was not a target race at all.

But during the night I awoke once or twice and had some second thoughts.  Why not give it a try?  I am, after all (as noted in a previous post) not right in the head.  Martha knew her asthma might give her problems in the cold, dry air, and she opted for the treadmill; but I dressed out and headed over the bridge to Morehead City, our car buffeted a little in the sharp wind.

The Cocoa 5-K was a low-key event last year, and it was the same this year, but the course seemed to be pretty close to five kilometers (I registered 3.12 on my Garmin) and I was looking at it as a hard training run.  There were plenty of strollers and small children milling around, and the start/finish line did not materialize until the very last moment.  A woman (the Race Director?) thanked us for coming.  And suddenly we were off! - a stroller bumping up against the back of my legs, two parents holding a three-year-old between them by the hands in front of me, and many children sprinting and stopping, sprinting and stopping, stretching out in single file on that winding sidewalk, finally warming up a little in the morning sun, until we reached Evans Street and could spread out.  There must have been 150 of us, and half of the children seemed to know one another; when we turned around the barrel at the end of the street, I discovered that I was in the front third of the field.  I was happy with my time of 31:25.

There was, as promised, a crowded little tent at the finish, but it was heated and there were bananas and cups of hot chocolate, a pretty good combination.  The wind picked up even more as I cooled down, ambled over to the finish line, and started chatting with those standing there.  I love watching runners finish a race and talking to the finish-line volunteers.  A man about my age told me I had run a "blessed" race, and then I discovered he was a youth pastor from the Swansboro Church of God.

"Can you imagine how hard it was to get seventeen teenagers together and loaded into a bus by 7:30 this morning?" he asked.

"That must have been harder than running 3 miles," I said. 

I left before the awards - 10-year age groups, and if I had managed to place, my "trophy" would have been two tickets to the Carolina Chocolate Festival soon to be underway in the Civic Center.  But it was a good day, as it always is at the end of a race, people laughing and applauding their friends crossing the finish line, the sun rising higher and higher, and that warm, satisfying feeling of exhausted legs.

And hot chocolate!  I returned with that coveted Cocoa 5-K shirt featuring the happily running chocolate bar with a ragged bite taken out of one corner, which I absolutely love.