pat's run

this morning, julie and i woke up bright and early (5:30 a.m.) to participate in the 6th annual pat tillman run.  julie's best friend kristyn joined us in the early morning "fun" and was kind enough to actually drive us to the event.

pat tillman is a former ASU football player who went on to play for the arizona cardinals.  a couple years after joining the cardinals he decided to join the military and fight in iraq.  during his 3rd tour he was killed in the line of battle.  his family then decided to form a foundation in his honor to reward community leadership among young adults.  pat's run is their big annual fundraiser.  

this year julie and i were among 25,000 other people who participated.  i decided to run the 4.2 miles (tillman's number for ASU was 42...hence the distance) while julie and kristyn walked it.  i was actually a little excited.  this was my 1st running event since i did one called the borgess run in kalamazoo with my friend jim back in the early 90s. 

the run started about 20 minutes late due to the sheer volume of people coming in for it, so at about 7:20 a.m. the fastest runners started...and finished by the time the folks in my corral and i got started.  we were instructed to place ourselves in "corrals" organized by the time each person thought they would be able to run a mile in.  i chose the 12 minute corral.   julie & kristyn were a few further back in the walking corral.  

for all of us the distance went a lot faster than we anticipated.  i know i really enjoyed the run.  i wound up finishing with a time of 41.26 minutes (better than i thought).  julie and kristyn clocked in at 90 minutes.   the coolest thing about the race is it ended on the 42 yard line in sun devil stadium, where ASU plays football.  julie was excited because it was her 1st time actually being on the field.  

there were a couple downsides to the run, aside from the early hour it started.  :)  one was we could have arrived a little later since we didn't realize we could just walk to the starting line just before the race.  the 2nd was they ran out of post-race snacks by the time julie and kristyn finished.  no bananas, oranges, water or gatorade were left when they finished.  this was definitely due to a lack of organization on the part of the organizational committee.  

i would definitely like to do another run like pat's run again.  it was a great feeling when i finished, and it felt good to run past so many other people.