Race Recap: West Virginia 5K Championship

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend! One of the major highlights this weekend for me was the West Virginia 5K Championship, which was held Saturday in Huntington. This 5K coincides with the state’s birthday, which was the day before the race on Friday. I’ve never seen other states so passionate about their state’s day of birth, and this is one of the many reasons why I am so proud to be a born and raised West Virginia gal! All day on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram I saw numerous posts from many people regarding West Virginia day! Yes, that’s right world, West Virginia is its own state and has been since 1863. We are NOT, I repeat NOT part of Virginia. You wouldn’t believe how many people I meet that don’t know West Virginia is a state. It’s truly appalling.

WORD!

Hello, basic geography anyone?! Well, now that I’ve got that little rambling rant in, I will continue to talk about the race itself!

The West Virginia 5K Championship is an event that promotes fitness and an overall healthy lifestyle. West Virginia is usually sited as an “unhealthy state,” and Huntington, specifically, was deemed one of the most “unhealthy cities” a few years ago. This race in particular is an effort to change that unfortunate stigma by welcoming runners and walkers of all fitness levels to participate. Proceeds from the race are donated to the United Way River Cities and used to help fight childhood obesity. Anything that encourages fitness as well as works to turn a negative statistic into a positive one is great to me. This was my second year running this race with the husband. Things didn’t exactly go as planned this year race-wise, but that’s life. We must take the setbacks, accept the challenges and work to overcome them!

On Friday we picked up our race packets and checked out the expo. Normally for races that aren’t Run Disney I wait until the morning of to get my race gear, but since we don’t live in Huntington, I didn’t want to wake up any earlier than I had to Saturday. Not to mention, they were giving away WV 5K 2014 pint glasses to the first 500 participants to pick up their race stuff. Well, obviously I love me some race swag and especially LOVE my WV 5K 2013 pint glass, so this was a must-have item. We didn’t really spend too much time at the expo itself since we were hungry. Also, I hate to be *that person* but Run Disney has really spoiled all other race expos for me. It’s just not the same! The expo for the most part was well organized, with the exception of some chaotic congestion near the bib pick-up area. Runners were to pick up race bibs by knowing their race number, and most, including myself, did not know theirs. The swag was pretty great for a “local” 5K: the coveted 2014 pint glass and best of all, a tech shirt! Tech shirts are so much better than cotton because I can actually get use out of them! We had a quick dinner date at Olive Garden after the expo before heading home to turn in early for the night.

Tech Shirt and Pint Glass! Love the race SWAG!

Saturday we got up earlier than we even do for work (yuck!) and headed to Huntington. We only had some Clif Gels for breakfast, but that was fine for us. I know many runners are shaking their fingers at us for not “eating enough” but we both tend to get sick easily if we don’t have much time between eating and running. Pardon me if I don’t feel like waking up at 3 a.m. to eat a bagel and/or Clif Bar. I only do that crazy crap for Run Disney! The energy before the race was great and I was happy that while there was 100 percent humidity it didn’t feel as sweltering hot as last year. I wore my lime green Team Sparkle running skirt, which got many compliments but some weird looks too. It’s all good. Haters gonna hate! Lol! I’m a proud skirt runner! After taking a huge pre-race “selfie” with the mayor of Huntington, the group of 600 plus runners, including us, were off!

The first mile was going decent until the dreaded rock that I happened to step on in the middle of the street. I didn’t realize there was rock there until I stepped on it and managed to BADLY roll my ankle. If it hadn’t been for the husband catching my arm, this would have easily resulted in me face planting right into the pavement! Upon next step, I immediately knew I did more than simply tweak my ankle like I often do on runs. Usually I might turn it a bit, which is due to it already being weak from an old high school cross country injury. Normally when I “tweak it” the pain only lasts for a split second and I’m good to go. I quickly realized this wasn’t the case as each step I took got more and more painful. It was even more irritating that it happened before we even approached the first mile marker! The husband asked if I was ok, and I decided to tell him it was fine and tried to do my best to ignore the pain hoping that if I did it would go away.

Well, before we approached the second mile marker it became evident my ignore tactic wasn’t working and we had to unfortunately slow our pace way down. We even had to take a moment to stop at the water station and see if I could stretch it. We didn’t stop long at all, but this is something I NEVER do and have NEVER DONE in a 5K! That’s when the husband really knew something was definitely wrong. He asked if we should stop and then my stubborn nature really kicked in and I replied “absolutely not! I never quit!” I sucked it up and pushed forward. By the time we had a little over a half mile left, I was in a lot of pain, but you better believe when we came to the finish line stretch that I somehow reached deep in my gut and pulled out a pretty fast finishing kick. I passed a lot of people down that last 100 meter stretch so much so that someone shouted “get it lady!” at me haha! That finishing kick was two-fold: a will to be done ASAP so I could sit down and assess the ankle damage and because I was frustrated with how the race had gone and at least wanted to enjoy a good sprint at the end!

As soon as we finished the husband said his feet were bothering him most of the race since his new shoes still weren’t quite broken in, but he didn’t want to mention it while we were running because he knew how irritated I was over rolling my ankle. I must thank him again on here for putting his own discomfort aside to be the positive motivator that I needed during the race! Usually I am the cheerful one when doing races together, so this was a role reversal! Back to the race and time for my one major complaint: we saw absolutely no trainer, medical tent or place to get ice post-race. The husband and his crafty skills ended up finding a bag and taking ice from a water cooler to create a makeshift ice bag for me to use on my ankle. After the post-race ice debacle, I limped to the area where the Brown Dog Yoga instructors were offering a free post-race yoga stretch. I enjoyed the post-race yoga, except of course the parts where I had to balance on my right foot since well, the ankle clearly wasn’t feeling it (obviously.)

Fun at the West Virginia 5K 2014!

Overall despite my ankle snafu, I had a great time at the West Virginia 5K Championship. Most races this would have likely ruined the whole experience for me, but this 5K is really enjoyable and I still had fun. It was FAR from my best time, but considering the circumstances I think we did pretty well. After finishing and feeling the pain that came from simply walking, it was clear to me that my adrenaline and stubborn nature fueled me to the finish. The Marshall Men’s Basketball Team also made the race enjoyable and kept me laughing the whole time. They were hilarious! The entire team ran the race, and it always impresses me to see coaches not only value running as conditioning but to also show support in the community where their university is located. As members of the team finished they stuck around the finish area to high five everyone as they completed the race. I was very impressed with their demeanor. I am a WVU fan FOREVER, but this team endeared themselves to me so much so that I’m going to have to cheer for them too (except when they play my beloved Mountaineers, of course!)

It was a fun weekend and a fun race. I love doing races with the husband and even though I badly rolled my ankle, I am still glad we did the West Virginia 5K for the second time. Sometimes not all races are sunshine and rainbows and we have to overcome a little adversity along the way. Who else raced this weekend? Who else has dealt with injury either before or during a race? How did you work to overcome that challenge? I’d love to hear all about it and I commend those of you that have had and conquered the many challenges that come with running!

(Update: Since people have asked and for those wondering, my ankle is still pretty sore but feeling much better today. As of now, I am still forging on with the RWRunStreak because I am soooo close to being finished that I can’t fathom stopping at this point. I’ve been icing A LOT to help with swelling and on Sunday and today I did very light runs at an easy pace. Sunday’s run was quite unpleasant, but in a way the running seemed to help make my ankle less stiff. Believe me I would have sucked it up and stopped if it was absolutely too painful to keep going. I’ve also finally used the much talked about KT Tape, so expect a future blog review on that! Hopefully my ankle continues to feel better! Fingers crossed!)

Ice Ice that ankle baby!