Run like you are in the ghetto

Over the weekend we visited David's cousins in Vermont. It was a gorgeous weekend and since I like messing with my husband I signed him up for a 5k without warning him.

I figure if I don't let him train I have half a chance of beating him. Yeah, right.

We left the girls with the family and headed off to the race. This was the first time we ever raced when we didn't know the locale. I was thinking bonus points for adventure. David thought idiot points for not being able to find the start of the race.

We finally find the sign-in station and are told the race begins in 5 minutes.  Plenty of time, right? Well as I am tying my sneakers back at the car we hear READY SET GO....

We hurry down to the start, in dead last, with the announcer saying you can catch up. Which we did, until we figured out that there were no signs telling us which way to go. We begin staying in the middle of the pack, moving slowly out of dead last. Except we were not the only ones lost. Even the locals got confused. As we headed into the ghetto neighborhoods we quickly see a woman running back towards us saying, GO THE OTHER WAY!!!!!!

We get through mile one. Not that there was a sign to tell us, thank goodness for Nike+ Run, at my fastest pace yet.

As we start looping back to the center of town and figure out that we know where we are going David begins leaving me in the dust. See we thought we knew where the finish line was. So he slowly began edging to the front of the pack. This was fine, because there were still people for me to follow.

Except we were only at mile 2. At this point I can no longer see David, but there are a couple of people in front of me to show me the way. If only the finish line was where I thought it was. As I turned the corner really thinking this was it, I was done. I hadn't walked once and my reward was finishing the race not in dead last and not in the wrong part of town.

Then I lost my focal point. She either ducked into a store or was a figment of my imagination all this time. I am at a T in the road. I either have to go right or left. Since the course went in a zig zag pattern I have no freaking idea where to turn. I look behind me and see a nice woman running behind me. I ask, Which way do we go? And she replies:

I think to the right.

You think? Okay, let's go for it. We do the last mile of the race more or less together with no one else to be found. As we finish the last freaking hill (why are there hills at the end of a race) I round the corner to see David running back towards me.

Oh crap, I think. Now he is lost.

Nope, he was just running back to make sure I figured out which way to go. I finish the race behind David, but with my best time ever. Only to find out that the race not only did not finish where I thought it was going to, it also finished a half-mile away from our starting point. Which is just not fair.

I learned a couple of things with this race:

• David is just humoring me by running at my pace.
• Races should have clear signs telling us where to go
• When you run through a possible ghetto you will run faster, even up a hill
• When you are lost there will be some one nice to say GO RIGHT
• A banana never tasted so go than at the end of a 5k