Monday, September 3, 2007

Sunny Lake Labor Day 5K - Aurora, OH

Derek, Me, Tami & Kristen
This morning Tami and I picked up Derek and drove about 10 minutes to Sunny Lake Park in Aurora to meet her friend Kristen for the annual Aurora Labor Day 5K. This was the first time that Tami and I had run this race and Kristen's first 5K race ever. The weather was great again today (upper 60s for race start) as it has been this entire holiday weekend.
After signing up and getting our bib numbers, Derek and I went out for a brief warmup on the path and then walked over to the starting line about 10 minutes before the start of the race. It didn't look like there was going to be an extreme amount of runners (100+), but we were both wondering how they would be able to start the race efficiently since the paved path is only about 8 feet wide. Once the race began everyone spreaded out pretty quickly though with the faster runners lining up front.
Derek and I started off together for the first half mile or so and then gradually fell into our own individual running pace. I was feeling pretty good... a lot better than yesterday's run.. and made it to the first mile in about 6:45. The course is almost all entirely flat with the exception of one small uphill and basically consists of one and a half loops on a 1.75 mile paved path around the lake. I was glad that I felt pretty strong for most of the race and was able to keep an even pace... running the 2nd mile again in 6:45 and the last mile in 6:40, giving me an overall finish time of 20:40 and a first place award in my age group. Derek finished only about 30 seconds or so behind me and also received an age group award. And Tami finished with Kristen for her personal best time of 28:46.
Included with your registration is a unique post race all-you-can-eat pancake and sausage breakfast, done by Chris Cakes of Ohio. While waiting in line you get to watch everyone try to catch their pancakes on their plate as they are being flipped by the cook.

Mark - aka "Flapjack"

This was probably the best part of the entire run... I can definitely see this race becoming a labor day tradition!

Mark in action

Later on in the day Tami and I went to downtown Hudson for the 3rd Annual "Taste of Hudson", where we sampled foods from local restaurants.

Along with the food and entertainment, they had some pretty sweet cars on display. Here's a few pictures of them...

Rolls Royce

Ferrari

Ford

No comments: