Media Five Mile Race

This is Dave and I on Veterans Square after the race.

I had two goals for this race. #1) To Finish. I managed that with minimal walking. I walked through several water stops and again on my way to the 8th Street hill the second time around. The hill was goal #2) Run up the hill both times. Dave sat at the top of the hill for motivation. It worked. :) I had two private goals as well. The first two were the only ones that really mattered. The second two were "it would also be nice if..." wishes. #1) Finish in less than one hour (done!) #2) Finish in 55 minutes or less (made it by 28 seconds!).

This is me coming up the hill the second time. The Media Five Miler is two 2.5 mile loops. The 8th Street hill comes up the first time between mile 1 and 2 and the second time between mile 3 and 4. I was muttering to myself at this point "Who's idea was this".

I was amazed at the number of people running and the number of spectators. The race caps at 1200 - or so they say - I know I saw at least one bib # over 1200 though so I'm not sure how that works. I expected a lot of spectators on State Street - and there were - but truly on every street at every corner there were lots and lots of people! This was very helpful in terms of motivation. They cheered, some played music, some held signs, and some put out spray from their hoses in case you wanted to cool off.

Phillyfit was very helpful to me for this race. I ran it because I coudn't run with the group today (6 miles) so I decided to do the 5 mile race instead. I have taken in lots of advice from Phillyfit. No one is shy about offering it and no question is every smirked at either. It's a truly supportive environment. If I heard it once I heard it a thousand times "Don't go out too fast" I think this went a long way toward the goal of finishing. If I had gone out too fast I no doubt would have run out of steam at the end. As it was I walked some as I said above, but I didn't let that bother me and even with the walking bits I made my secret goal of less than 55 minutes.

Toward the end.. during the last half mile.. I started to wonder if this was all I could do. Was the marathon an unrealistic goal. But a year ago I wouldn't have even thought about trying this and now I did it. So I'll stick with the plan and see how far I can go.

So now it's on to continue training and possible sign up for the Philadelphia Distance Run on September 21st. I think I'll decide about that by the end of the week.

Here are my official results from the Media Five Mile web page.

MEDIA 5 MILE RUN
Race Date:06-20-08
Bib Number 655
First Name Paula
Last Name Tansey
City Media
State PA
Zip 19063
Sex F
Age 48
Time 54:32
Pace 10:54.4
Place 1013
Gender Place 382/465
Age Group Place F45-49: 26/34
Masters Age PLP 49.5%

Marathon Training

If you've been reading here you know that I signed on to the Philadelphia Marathon.

Well today I began work with Phillyfit, a group training for the marathon. I decided that to realistically finish in 7 hours I had better run or job some of this thing. So I decided to train with other runners. That puts this in the category of learning new things.

What attracted me to this group is the theme that it doesn't matter who you are, what your running experience is, or how well-trained you are. All that matters is trying. The group consists of people who walk and people who run very fast. There are people who have completed marathons, daulathons and triatholons and a lot, like me, who have never done any of those things before.

Before today, the longest I had run at one time wihtout stopping and/or walking part of the way was maybe close to 2 miles. Today, the first day of training, we had to run/walk a time trial. This would determine our starting point so that we could be grouped with others of similar ability. The time trial distance was 3 miles. It took a lot of internal talking to myself but I was determined not to be scared off by this. My goal was to start and finish at a pace that was not walking.

We were encouraged from the start to go at an easy pace. One where we could carry on a conversation at the same time. I focused on that and on keeping my legs moving and I completed the 3 miles without walking in 33 minutes, 4 seconds. Excuse me, but I am very impressed with myself right now. Participating with a group really helped. My pace run put me in the red group - 10 minute mile or slower.

One day down and many more to go. My long term goal, obviously, is to finish the marathon running or walking. My short term goals are to complete each step of the training. We have a weekly schedule involving three days of timed running/walking. The group meets every Saturday to run/walk for distance.

I'm excited, intimidiated (but a little less so than last night) and determined. I'll keep you posted.

Now I know what 'brackish' means

"They" (whoever they are) say you learn (or should learn) something new everyday. I get a kick out of that. On Wednesday, we took a trolley tour of Annapolis, MD and I learned that brackish means, part seawater and part freshwater. I always thought brackish referred to the color of the water. And maybe to a certain extent it does if the combination of salt and fresh affects the color. I don't know. THAT was my new thing for Wednesday, 9-19-07. I learned a lot about Annapolis too, but I knew I was going to learn that so it wasn't as big a moment.


We were in Annapolis for part of Dave's birthday baseball trip. Dave would like to get a hat from every major league baseball team. He wants the official game hat and one of the stipulations (self-imposed) is that he must attend a game at that team's stadium before getting the hat. Last year I took him to Yankee Stadium. This year we had tickets for the Washington Nationals. I booked a B&B in Annapolis for Wednesday night and Thursday night and we had tickets for the game on Thursday night.


We started the day with breakfast at the Trolley Stop in Media. We checked in at the Scotlaur Inn and after walking around town a bit decided on a trolley tour where besides learning about the definition of brackish we learned a lot about the history and architecture of Annaoplis. It was truly interesting. Annapolis is a tourist town but not a tourist trap. It is a very functional city too.

You will never go hungry there. Every other store front, it seemed, was a restaurant. We settled on a place called Buddy's for dinner. They specialize in ribs and crabs and do a very good job! I orderd a combo - 3/4 rack of ribs and 3 medium crabs. Dave didn't think I'd finish it. With a challenge like that who could I not? Truthfully, though, crabs are a hard work meal. I needed the ribs to keep up with the cracking and picking out the crab! The restaurant in on the second floor with windows all around so you get a nice view of the city too. I highly recommend eating there if you go.