Really Chilly Road Race Re-Cap



Time for The Game!

This morning, I ran in the Really Chilly Road Races in the 5K division.



   I was somewhat torn about running in this race because, as it happened, the race was being run right in the middle of the Canada-Sweden Olympic gold medal hockey game. I was able to watch the first two periods of the game before I had to leave. I was then able to catch a bit of it on the large screen TV at the race venue and by this time the score was 3-0 for Canada, so I was able to start the race with a light heart. Yay Canada!!




Yum!

   I started off the morning with a somewhat larger version of my typical breakfast--omelette and multigrain gluten-free bread with peanut butter. Topped off with a coffee in one of my favourite mugs.




Re-living past glories!

Thank goodness there was a T.V. there!

Bit of an expo.

   I had to leave after the second period of the game and, at the time, they were replaying some highlights from the '72 series against the Russians and we all know how THAT ended up. Good omen!


   The race was the first in the series of London Honda Road Races this year. It was held downtown in the area of London surrounding the Western Fair District. This is the new name of the whole area surrounding the Western Fair Raceway, a harness racing track. These days, it has become an entertainment area, with a casino, performing venues and a new hockey arena (with an Olympic-sized ice pad to go with the regular-sized one!)


On the race track, headed for the starting line!

   The race actually started (ironically) on the race track. This is where things started to unravel a touch for me---for some reason I couldn't get the right screen on the Garmin to come up. Not sure what the problem was but it meant basically running naked and depending on the mileage markers along the way. This kind of screwed me up because (I swear) I kept seeing the markers repeat themselves. Part of the problem was there was also going to be a 10K race that day and I'm not sure it was configured the same way as the 5K. Or I'm getting old, who knows??
   The race route had us running past buildings which once had been huge employers for London, businesses such as McCormick's (cookies) and Kellog's (cereal). These have either closed or are about to. Pretty sad, actually.
   Because of the Garmin issues, I have no idea what my time was and won't until the times are officially posted. I'm guessing somewhere around the 36-minute mark. I think the winner in my age group (60-65) was in the low twenties so this is now a bit of a goal (and possibly an unrealistic one) for me in the future. We'll see...


Leaving the finish line area.

   The races in this series are all fundraisers and today the beneficiary of our efforts was the London and Area Running Association. These races are pretty fun with lots of door prizes and camaraderie. The "swag" today consisted of a long-sleeved tech shirt which was pretty nice insofar as it actually fit me pretty well. Which means I actually might wear it someday!
   On the trip home I managed to get some pics of downtown London. If I can figure out how to get them captioned, I will (Blogger's been fussy lately). I took them on the main drag, Dundas Street, and there's a pic of London's tallest building, One London Place. At 24 stories, it is the tallest building in southwestern Ontario.
   The next race in the series is the Downtown 5K, on April 18th. It is, as the title suggests, yet another 5K. The race after that, however, is  the Go The Distance 10K on June 22. Currently, this is slated to be my first 10K race! Lots of work to do between now and then!


One London Place