Another PR at the Gear N Beer 5K!

Happy Thanksgiving week everybody!  I am blogging today from my mom's house in Rhode Island, where I will be working from for the week.  I haven't been home for a full week in Rhode Island for quite some time and I am looking forward to getting to spend some quality time with my family and friends while I am in town.

My week at home started out well as my mom, brother, and brother's girlfriend and I went out on Saturday night to try a new restaurant called Razzle Restaurant Wine Bar and Cupcakery in Cranston, RI (read the Yelp! review here).  I forgot to take photos of the food, but it was all delicious!  I split a salad and a pizza with my brother's girlfriend and every bite was pure heaven.  The 4 of us also each chose one of their specialty cupcakes to share.  Between the 4 of us we had an Oreo cupcake, Snickers cupcake, Lemon cupcake, and Apple Cinnamon cupcake.  Now, I have had a lot of cupcakes in my life, but let me tell you these were by far some of the BEST.  They were so moist and fluffy and seriously worth every bite of the high number of Weight Watchers points they consisted of.  Luckily, I planned ahead and had some exercise planned for my week at home.

On Sunday, my mom and I participated in the Mew's Tavern Beer N Gear 5K in Wakefield, RI.  My mom has been a runner her whole entire life, and I have always been on the sidelines to this hobby of hers.  It honestly gives me so much pleasure to be able to participate with my mom in races and share this passion of hers.  This past year we have completed two 10Ks together, and this race was our first 5K.

Mom and I at the Mew's Tavern 5K November 2011

Jamestown Bridge 10K April 2011

Gilette Stadium 10K July 2011

I was looking forward to doing another 5K to test whether or not my PR from the weekend before was a fluke or a real new standard in 5K times for myself.  Well, I certainly proved that the time wasn't just a fluke because I smashed that time by another 40 or so seconds -- and the Mews 5K was a considerably harder course than the Colon Cancer 5K (lots of hills, including a killer at the very end!!)  I finished with a time of around 30:08 -- which is a big improvement from 30:56 and SO CLOSE to my goal of breaking 30 minutes!

My mom and sister later in the day asked me if I wished I had just ran A LITTLE faster at certain points to have beat that goal.  But I am honestly really happy with that time... and am not sure where in the race to have pushed myself harder.  I am still honestly amazed at my improvements over the past few months and am SO proud of the time of 30:08.

With some of my mom's friends at post-race.

The 5K was a great, well organized race that ended with a big party.  Not surprisingly, since a Tavern hosted the race, there was beer aplenty at the finish.  What did surprise me, was that it was all free!  There were tons of beer selections, including my current obsession, Woodchuck Hard Cider's Fall brew.  They also had a huge post-race meal for everybody.  There was a shockingly large amount of food and beer considering the crowd was +1000!  We really lucked out with beautiful weather so the post-race party was a lot of fun with lots of friendly runners and spectators enjoying the beer, food and sunny weather.  Since I had splurged the night before, I was the designated driver for the day and also planned ahead and brought my own WW-points friendly snacks to keep me from being tempted by the BBQ, mac & cheese, and Chowder feast that was available after the race.

Check out that plate of food!!

Up next I have a 5K Gobble Wobble on Thanksgiving morning that I am running with my 4 best friends. I love that my life has changed to including these different activities with the people I love. I haven't decided yet if I am going to do a relaxed run or push myself to try and reach the under-30 minute mark on Thursday. I will keep you updated!!