I did it. I completed my very first 5k run ever. The official results are in and I met my time goal. I finished in 30:50.6 and I wanted to make it in 30 minutes. That means I averaged just under 10 minutes/mile. I came in 71st overall (out of 193 including walkers) and was 6th out of 9 in my age bracket, one minute behind number 5 and 22 minutes faster than the last placed man in my age bracket. Overall, I am pleased. The event was scheduled to start at 9AM, which is late even for a 5k. On top of that the race started 15 minutes late. And it was an 80° September day so it was pretty warm by the time we got going. I’ll be leaving some comments on the website that registered the run.

I met my goal. I completed the Couch to 5k program and a few weeks later (3 months to the day from when I started running) I ran my first 5k. So does that mean a return to the couch? No way. I’ve already picked out my next run in November and am considering hiring a personal trainer for a few weeks.  After that, we’re going in to winter and I’m going to keep running as long as I can but we’ll see. I’ll probably do another 5k in the spring and then train for a 10k later in the spring.

If I can do this, anyone can. It wasn’t that long ago when I was telling other people who were running that they were crazy or “better you than me” and just couldn’t fathom what would cause someone to run other than being chanced by someone bigger or better armed than them. Maybe some time I’ll blog on the many different things that inspired me to start.