Search the Community

My first race ever, the one that got me hooked, was my local Turkey Trot in Prospect Park. I've run it every year since even when I couldn't run it and, I know I say this about every race, it's my favorite race of the year. 2011 - My first race. I had been running for about four months. I did a one week "taper" leading up to the race because that's a thing that runners do before a race, right? I wore cotton yoga pants and a new thermal Craft shirt I had bought for the occasion because it was in the 50's and that's cold, right? They messed up the chip timing for the race and had me as 1st Female. I emailed them after I saw that and told them that there was no way that was possible, my time was forty something minutes (this was before my first Garmin and I didn't notice the time because I was still infatuated with the fact that I could run for five whole miles without stopping and that was good enough for me) They apologized and changed my time to 40:00. I was thinking more like 45:00-49:00 but I let it go. 2012 - I already had decided that I kind of wanted to earn that 40:00 someday but I don't remember this race at all. PPTC says I finished in 46:00. 2013 - I had just run my first marathon and I was having an amazing year. I really went for it in this one. I ran it in 43:07. After the traditional post race brunch with mom, I ran my entry for a muskratty thing but it wasn't called muskrat it was something about penguins. 2014 - I had just run my only 50 miler. My legs were perpetually dead. I figured I'd run this one to finish and next year I'd really go for that 40:00. I think my sister and BIL did this one too. Or maybe that was the year before and this year was the year with the penguins? Things like this make me miss the old Loop but that's a'whole'nother bloop. 2015 - I walked it on a ruptured plantar fascia and damaged PTT only I didn't know that's what the problem was just yet. My mom walked it with me. She had wanted to do it ever since my first one. We DFL'd it together. In fact, we had to hustle because they were literally about to unplug the mat as we crossed. 1:35:20 It's okay, next year I'd be back at it, right? 2016 - I was fresh off Philly! My first half back since all the foot stuff happened. I couldn't believe that I was running again! I couldn't believe I had run Philly! I was having the best few months! Oh yeah, I was in a walking boot due to giving myself a stress reaction and I walked it, boot and all, with two of my nephews and my sister. 1:19:17 This year I am coming off arguably the best running year I've ever had. I discovered that speedwork makes you faster! Who knew? But I'm also in the middle of a planned off season and haven't done anything remotely fast in over a month. And I have a terrible cold. I know that this isn't my year to chase down that 40:00 but if I'm feeling much better I may try to shave off some time. If not, my BRB Sarah is running it so I may hang back with her or my nephew and sister Sarah (yes, I have a plethora of Sarahs and Saras in my life) are run/walking it so I may hang with them. Either way, I can no wait to line up on Thursday. I can't wait to get another PPTC Turkey Trot medal to add to the collection and I can't wait to see what this race is going to look like when I'm looking at it from 2018. Happy Thanksgiving, Loop.