Thursday, August 30, 2012

AFC 5K and San Diego Nighttime Zoo

I signed up months ago to run the America's Finest City 5K on August 19th with some co-workers. I was so glad I didn't consider running the half marathon, because it was really hot and humid that day - I would've been miserable!  New rule: Races should not be scheduled in August! 

I was pretty out of shape for this run, since I hurt my foot a couple of months ago and have hardly run since then.  I'm able to handle short distances like this okay, but then my foot hurts for two days afterwards, so I'm still taking time off.

The race scenery was beautiful since we ran 3.1 miles through San Diego's famous Balboa Park, but it was hilly, too.  I had never had too many problems during a 5K before, but the lack of training + hills + humidity really got to me and I had to stop and walk a few times to catch my breath. 

 Dan and I at the start/finish line of the 5K.

 Co-workers and friends

I dragged Dan out of bed at 5:15 am to drive me to this race, so he figured he might as well get a run in while he was up anyway.  I was glad he was beside me since I think I took fewer walking breaks with him there.  Note my superhuman ability to spot the cameras during a race so I can smile for all my pictures. We each have our God-given talents, and I'm just glad mine has such far-reaching benefits for humanity. 

 My co-worker Janeece and I sweating profusely after the race. She's training for a half marathon on Labor Day, so she ran to the 5K site and back home again afterwards for a total 9-mile run!

 We stuck around to watch the half marathon winners cross the finish line.  This man won the race and finished in 1 hour 3 minutes.  That's a sub-5-minute mile for over 13 hilly miles! He didn't even look winded at the end.

 And I got this blurry photo of the first female finisher, whose time was 1 hour 16 minutes. She immediately starting limping and clutching her thigh after she crossed the finish line, so she apparently ran that fast with an injury. I just need to shave an hour off my half marathon time and I'll definitely beat her next year, no big deal.

We stopped for a picture at Balboa Park's pretty fountain before leaving to grab a big post-run breakfast at the Broken Yolk

Another highlight this month was getting to spend an evening at the zoo with our friends, Chris and Judy and their sons Ian and Jon.  Chris leads the Bible study I attend every Monday night, but Dan hardly ever gets to see their family.  The zoo has a nighttime program every summer, so we joined them last Saturday evening to check out the special events. The biggest show was a Chinese acrobat show that featured the most talented children on the planet. They had us all mesmerized for 45 minutes with their flipping/ balancing/ juggling/ flexibility skills.  Chris was recording it, and when their family watched the video later that week, he said they were just as entertained by Dan's enthusiastic commentary as they were by the performers, since he was sitting right next to Chris (and the video camera) shouting "No Way!" "That was Awesome!" "Holy Cow!" when something amazing happened. 

Afterwards, we strolled around the zoo, stopping to watch the smaller nighttime shows as we went.  It was a different perspective for us since we had only gone to see the animals in the past, and we had a lot of fun spending time with our friends. 

Some synchronized kid-juggling

The little kid on top back-flipped off the others and was caught by some of the "spotters" below 

This girl used her legs & feet to balance & spin all kinds of heavy objects.
 Chris and Judy said that Ian and Jon tried to do Chinese acrobat tricks all week after watching the show.

We did not. That would most likely end in an emergency room visit.
 We didn't see too many animals at the zoo that day, but we had a lot of fun hanging out with these two monkeys!  They're growing up so fast!

No comments: