I entered a 5K race this morning and afterward went to Sharon Woods park to walk an additional 4 miles. Yes, I’m training for a half marathon.

The race was a Westerville Rotary event that was nice. It was well organized and there was plenty of food and water at the end for us walkers.

Deb and I walked strong! We did the first mile in about 14:38 (a watch issue caused me to be a few seconds late starting the chrono), then 14:35, 14:10 and 44.40 for the last tenth. After the first mile we both agreed that we did not feel we were pushing hard for how fast we were. I tried to pick up the pace in the last half mile. I’m pretty happy with our time!

Two members of the Buckeye Striders won age-group awards against runners! Congratulations to Nancy and Elaine!

After the awards presentation, there were also “door” prizes, which was nice. My only complaint about this fun event is, if we registered as walkers and the rules said all walkers must walk, then shouldn’t there at least be prizes for the top three male and female finishers? Everything else was great!

Sharon Woods
Deb was the instigator for going to Sharon Woods after the race to get in an additional 4 miles. We went with Elaine and it was a lot of fun. We planned to walk about a 15-min mile since this was supposed to be a long-slow day. The first two miles were 15:24 and 15:10. Then we saw a friend and stopped for a couple minutes to chat and I stopped my watch at the wrong marker. (Oops.)

The temps are much milder than for a typical 4th of July, making it a perfect day for walking!

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