Race Review: Ward Parkway Thanksgiving Day 5k 11.26.2015

On Thanksgiving morning, my oldest son, Jax, and I woke up and headed out to our local Turkey Trot, the Ward Parkway Thanksgiving Day 5k. It also happened to be his *first* 5k. I'm pretty sure I was more excited about this little fact than he was, but we'll just leave that out. The race started at 9am, but we left our house around 7:40 to be able to have time to park and do packet pick up.

Here we are at the start line before the race began. Yes, that is a slice of pie on my head. I had hats for both of us, but Jax didn't want to wear it...and I don't blame him. They were pretty silly. 

The big guy before the race.

INKnBURN Christmas Sweater, Cable Knit Tights, and a pie hat!

A race photog found us and took these great pictures. 

We lined up in the shoot around the 10 minute pace with about 3800 of our closest racing friends. With the weather being pretty warm and the rain holding off, lots of people came out to get a little exercise in before the day of eating began.

Last selfie in the shoot before the gun went off.

The first mile is nice and mostly down hill. I didn't wear my running watch, but there were timing clocks at each mile marker, and from my best guessing and on-the-fly math skillz, I think we did that first mile in about 12:30 minutes.

Mile 2 was a little slower, but no big deal. There was the start of a rolling hill in there, and I think this one took closer to 13:00 minutes to complete.

At the end of the race, or at least about the last quarter of a mile I encouraged Jax to really put on the gas, give it all he had, and run ahead of me. He did that, but then he'd slow down, pull up, and check to make sure I was still behind him. I think he was a little nervous about getting lost in the crowd. 

Jax crossing the finish line

Jax has crossed and I'm just behind him

Jumping at the finish, and someone blocked my camera shot

And done. Good times!

Jax's finish time

My finish time

The finish line with our pumpkin pies!

There was a tent at the race set up to be a photo booth. These were are photos.

My youngest son Ollie did the 200m kids dash. He was also pretty excited to run. My husband and Ollie arrived at the race site about 90 minutes after Jax and I did so that they wouldn't have to hang out in the cold while waiting for the 5k runners to finish. Ollie has done a couple of kid dash races before and always enjoys them. I think he'll be a runner with me as well when he gets older.

At the start line

And they're off!

Ollie with Ward the Turkey

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