This morning started off just right.   Actually woke up right before my alarm.   Had a good night sleep, although maybe not enough.    Got up and was ready for the Queens 10K Crew to pick me up.    Moving right as scheduled, then the brakes get put on.

Literally.

We could arrived to Citifield right before 7:30 giving us plenty of time to get to the start line at 8:30.   At least it should have been more than enough time!   We literally did not park the car till 8:30.

The frustrating part is that there was more than enough parking, but they just didn’t have the lots open.   It was annoying.   It was frustrating.   It was not the volunteers fault who were directing traffic.   Someone made a mistake or underestimated or something, because it was ridiculous!

Why oh why when there is this much space did we have to wait an hour to get into the lot.   Crazy!

Then we had to do a 3/4 mile jog to the start line and literally jump into a corral and start the race.

Not the best way to start.

The corrals were crazy croweded probably due to people such as ourselves getting to the start line late.    Elbow to Elbow.   Bob and weave.   Stop and go.  Crazy start.

Then I settled into it or as much as I could settle in.   I was on pace.   I was on the money.   Then The little man in my head would not shut up as much as I told him to.   Physically, I think I may have had it in me today even with the heat.   Mentally, my mind just was not there.

Look at these beautiful negative splits……. Backwards!

Mentally, my head wasn’t in the game.   As much as I wanted to pretend it was, it was not there.   It did not help that I did not plan my music accordingly causing thoughts to pop into my head that I had no business thinking about while trying to run a race.

Physically, there is no reason that I needed to walk during this race.   Mentally, I admit that I took a few walk breaks.   There was a point that I almost gave up and walked.  At the end, I did push it but it was too little too late.   It was just not my day.   You need these bad running days to appreciate the good ones.

In the whole scheme of things, it is just a race.   It is not a make or break thing that I didn’t PR today.   It would have been nice, but at the end of the day (to me) I know it really doesn’t matter.   There will be other days, other races, and other PR’s.

And you know what?   As much as I’m going on that the race wasn’t my race, I ran it faster than last year. I still ran it pretty decently even if I walked a time or two.   I still finished with a good place and overall my pace was good.     Was it the race I wanted?   No, but those are the breaks.

I finished in 59:14.

So I was under an hour this year and still not a bad race.

Overall 5093 out of 9,982

Women 1594 out of 4,814

Age Place 110 out of 432

So I really think I need to shut up that it wasn’t a good race.   I know that I could have pushed myself and run better but I mentally didn’t care.

Every have one of those days and realize in the end it wasn’t so bad?

me too:)