46:05, UCF 5 Miler

Yesterday was the day. I felt like it came faster than Chrismtas day comes and goes. It was a very cold and crisp morning, which turned out to be perfect for the UCF 5 Miler. After all of my training and prep work, I was still nervous going into it. I had really only ran 5 miles one time before this, and at a 10 min/mile pace. That became my realistic goal, I just didn't want to go over 50 minutes. When you run with a lot of other really great runners, its easy to follow their lead at first, which is what I did and Erin had to remind me to stay back and keep my energy for the end. As I round each mile marker I seemed to be keeping about a 9 min/mile pace. Then I got to marker 4. I thought I may take forever and a day to finish that last mile. I was lagging behind pretty bad and Erin tried to keep my motivation up, but I felt like it was disappearing, fast! All I could think was 'This is almost over, if you blow your time you will regret it, you're body can handle 5 more minutes.' I finished in 46 minutes and 5 seconds. If I could have just picked up my pace at the end like erin was trying make me, I would have been in the 45 minute mark! But, I have to be happy with what I ended up with because I never thought that I could actually have finished in that time. It is a great feeling and Im so excited to keep improving!

Now, I just have to make sure that at the Turkey Trot, 5K, I have a time of under 27 minutes, since that was the pace I had this time. I cant go down, only up!