Well, it's done. I ran my 5K, thanks to Angela and Shawn. The St. Patrick's Day 5K that benefitted the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and Hands on Discovery. I got to tri-state athletic club around 8:30am, found the Collinses right away, and registered. I paid my $20 and got my number: 689. I kept thinking, "What am I doing here?" I wouldn't have gone at all if Shawn and Angela hadn't been running. Anyway, it was cool to see all those people really into running. I saw more spandex there than I did through all of the 80's. Why do they do that? I saw a lot of familiar faces from when I worked out at the club. I walked around some of the boothes looking for free stuff. I got a free USI t-shirt, a coobook, a pen, a local magazine, and a sticky hand for Abby. There were animals there for the kids to pet and soup for after the race. There was no Gatorade. Of course, I got a long sleeve t-shirt for running. It was pretty cold at first, but I had on so many layers that I felt pretty comfortable: 3 sports bras, 2 long sleeve shirts, sweatpants, mittens, and a sock hat. We lined up on the starting line, near the back, and I saw Jason and the kids before we started. Right away, the pack took off much faster than we were going to go. We had gone about 200 yards when I saw that the front of the pack was about 3/4 of a mile ahead of us. Crazy. We ran first behind Burlington, by Dairy Queen, beside Hobby Lobby and then on to Virginia towards Burkhardt. We turned left before we got there and headed back by Los Bravos and over to Vogel towards Green River. We turned left on the street with American General and then back on to Virginia. The finish line was on the corner of Virginia and Tennis Lane. The first mile was a bit tough because it always is and the path was straight into the wind for awhile. I ran that in 10:30 or something. Then the 2nd mile came. It was far worse than the first. I felt like I had slowed to a crawl. My sides ached and I had to force myself to have better posture to breathe better but that hurt more. My hands were sweating, so off came the mittens. I had to carry them. I just kept thinking, "I can't walk. I won't walk. I just have to keep my legs moving. Don't walk!" People were running past me, then I would pass them while they walked, then repeat. The 3rd mile was coming. I had done the second mile in around 11 minutes. That surprised me. The wind was to my back now and I was thinking better thoughts. I realized I was feeling better enough to speed up just slightly. I kept feeling better as I ran. It was weird. I never felt good, mind you, but better. I got within a half mile or so and was praying for God to carry me to the finish line. At around 1/4 mile, I normally speed up, but this time I had no more gears in me. I just kept my pace and watched the people telling me I was doing a good job. They say that to everybody. What would be a bad job? Anyway, I spotted Jason and the kids just before crossing the finish line at 32:48. They took off my number and I walked back to Jason as the Collinses approached the finish line, too. Cool, it was over, and I was glad I had done it even if I had no chance of winning. Too bad we forgot the camera. I would guess I finished in the last 25% of runners or fewer. The soup sounded terrible, but I eventually ate it after cooling down. It was good but I burnt my throat as I swallowed. The rest of Saturday was great because I had already accomplished my goal for the day. Sunday was not so good because Duke lost the ACC tourney for the first time in 5 years and then we both had headaches. The end.