Still trying to get over this exciting (slash exhausting) week. This race was UBER FABULOUS!!!!

My sister had made me tutu, a while ago. And I had decided I’d wear it at the Mini… The Mini10K is nothing mini, it’s a humongous 10K, with a 40 year history and an amazing legacy. My report from last year is here, and you can find yesterday’s event’s info here, the race story, a video, and pictures (and there’s one of me there!).

And this time around the race was dedicated to Grete Waitz, so we had a very full field and very important guests, including Jack, Grete’s husband. This was going to be the first time men were allowed in the race and we were very all honored to have him there.

I put the humongous tutu on and I felt so strange… I had always wanted to race with a costume but I just never did. And I was dreading it too. Is it going to be annoying? (I hadn’t tried it… when? where?). Are people going to laugh at me? Everybody said,you’re just running the race, you’re not racing in that, right??? 

Ugh. Still, I had committed to doing it and there was no way back. Also, I had done the 5K on Wednesday and wasn’t even sure if I could recover in time. My legs were sore and tired yesterday… so…  I might has well just HAVE FUN with this!

I got into my corral with a couple of team mates and two seconds later I am being photographed for everything and interviewed for a Norwegian TV show. As a tribute race to Grete, they asked about her and I could have started crying right there. There was just so much to say about Grete!!!

And all this was happening in 4 minutes!!! I got so busy, I didn’t have time to get my Garmin to find a satellite before the gun. @#^$%*&__@#)!@!!! Gun goes off, no Garmin, I go, whatever.

Everyone around me goes wild and I let them. I know now that I can hold back in the beginning. I’ve done this race too many times already to get caught up on Central Park West’s insanity. Mile 1 is all along the park, a gorgeous street we never get to run on (it’s where your family is waiting after the marathon!).

My last 10K was the Scotland Run exactly 2 months ago. I had done 45:57, average pace of 7:24, but I wasn’t sure I had that yesterday. And apparently, it was 96% humidity. I say apparently because I didn’t even check the weather. After Wednesday’s 94 degrees, anything looked amazing and I didn’t even care!!!

Now, let me tell you what happens when you run in such a big tutu: everybody (EVERYBODY) screams at you, cheers you on, points at you, takes pictures, and/or smiles at you. I could not help but smile and wave the whole 6.2. Seriously, it’s all I did. I don’t even remember running or suffering, or worrying about my time or my legs. I had never had so many people helping me along the course!!!!

In the marathon, everybody shouts the  name on your shirt; but this is a shorter race, the crowd is smaller, and people don’t wear their names. Also, I was in the first corral surrounded by some very fast and fierce-looking women, so the contrast must have been pretty crazy. And everybody wanted in in the fun! Women running with me made comments too, and would hang on for the crowd support.

Still, the tutu was NOT quite aerodynamic and at some points a lot of it would bunch up between my legs…!!! But I’ll figure it out eventually… It was just an out of this world experience. I would definitely do it again….!! Scrap that, I WILL definitely do it again.

And I wasn’t even looking at my watch, because I knew it was all wrong! That probably added a whole sense of WHATEVER andlet’s just have fun to it!! Having just done a hard 5K two days ago, I was just letting the legs do whatever they wanted!

I kept going, waving, bopping around people. I seriously think I saw 95% of the people I know in the park cheering! (At some point, this girl running by me said something like “you must be super famous or something”, HA!).

I turn around the corner and the race is over. Pffffffffffffffffffff, don’t you hate it when that happens? A girl collapses right behind me and I sprint through chute to get her Gatorade (what is up with all these people passing out??).

Finish time (I’d discover way later, because Garmin didn’t have any accurate records): 45:30.

Avg pace: 7:20  (a 30 seconds PR, yey!!!!!! How? No clue! )

Overall Place: 212 of 4748

Age Place: 29 of  800 (keep in mind these women were in my AG: Deena Kastor, Lornah Kiplagat, Jo Pavey, Magdalena Lewy Boulet, etc.!!!!)

Age Grading: 67.55%

Total Fabulosity!!!

After the finish, a lot of people came up to me to tell me they loved my outfit and some wanted pictures..! I thought it was totally crazy!!! I then had to dash to meet up with Christopher McDougall again so I missed the Awards Ceremony and the fun stuff which I always love to stay for.

But it was a super osom and amazing racing week overall. First I raced a kid on a skateboard on Monday, then a hot 5K and got an Age Group Win on Wednesday, then an insane PR on Saturday while having the funnest time of my life. What else could a girl want?

More pictures on the race, video and stories, here.