run this amazing day

I promise I do actually have things to say that aren't race reports, but I really want to get all my thoughts down on those before they slip into the fog of my ironman-training-brain (gak, how did ironman get so close, so soon?).  This one was a late add to the schedule, and the whole trip was much more about spending a girly weekend two close friends than the race itself.  I flew into Atlanta very late Thursday night and by the time I got in bed with my favorite snuggling  screaming  friend Julie, it was the wee hours of Friday morning.  We slept in and went out to breakfast and then I happened on a long course pool somewhere in northern GA on my way up to Chattanooga. For a lot of reasons, there's been a higher than normal level of stress in my life over the past month or so.  Just life, the ups and downs that everyone deals with, but this trip felt a bit like an escape from all of that.  Like I finally had time to exhale.  The pool was gorgeous, wide empty lanes and cool

There's a local series of races that happens on Tuesday nights here in Boulder, and the group that I coach with picks a few as team races, so I decided to jump in and race one.  I was still coming out of my 70.3 recovery so I wasn't quite sure what the expect out of the body, plus night races are always a bit of a gamble against the tummy.  The day had been sunny and warm but as we drove over to the reservoir, clouds started to blow in.  I got in a nice long warm-up with my friend Jen, we ran most of the out-and-back course which is a little hill up then a little hill down, out across the dams (dirt/rocks/gravel), then turn around and come back.  Pretty simple. I warmed up with my group of runners, stripped off my shirt and then it was time to go.  Like most people, I have a love/hate relationship with the 5K.  I love it because it's so short, just a blast of fire and then it's over, but I hate it because I think it's all the pain of ironman crammed into ~25 mi