28 weeks pregnant with a race report

Two weeks ago, I had a shock with my doctor abandoning me. Sniff, sniff. And just to make things even better I received a few irritating pregnant comments. Last week, however, was much better. I'm fairly certain I found a new doctor. I have an appointment to meet her; hopefully I'll like her.

Also, there was a workplace fun run last week! It was advertised as a 5K, but the fitness center fellow who measured out the course informed us at the start that it is was actually a 3.2 miler. Then he said, "well, if you want to be technical it's closer to 3.3 miles." Ahhh, non runners are so funny, aren't they? If it's closer to 3.3 miles it can hardly be called a 5K, but that's okay. It was a race to get people out and moving. There were 40 people who ran, mostly men (a number of others walked). It was a lot of fun! I've been looking forward to the fun run because I miss racing and I knew this would be low key. I wound up running 23:37 and being conservative and assuming that the course 3.2 (rather than 3.3) that's 7:22 pace. I was pleasantly surprised. I didn't really race or run super hard, so I'm pleased with the pace. Plus, I'm packing on an extra 16 pounds now...ugh. Oh, also, I was the first female finisher and came in 6th overall.

Being as pregnant as I am, I did receive a lot of attention before, during, and after the race. To my relief, though, it was all good. Only the company nurse seemed concerned, but she's older and not a runner (so I'm not counting her). Everyone else had fun cheering me on. A guy I passed even shouted out "great job, my wife ran until a week before our baby was born and it was great." I was surprised because like I told Nick "who wants to get passed by a pregnant lady? I wouldn't..." People were surprisingly gracious. Below you can a picture of me running the race at 27 weeks and 4 days pregnant. The guy in blue, who ran with me most of the way, had a 3:20 marathon debut. He finished a good 30 seconds ahead of me, and apparently complained to all the running guys that I pushed him to run faster than he wanted to. (I only know this because Nick was in the locker room and later divulged the information to me.) I don't believe him though. He looked just fine to me.

You see that baby belly peaking from the bottom of my shirt?

Overall, running is still going well. I am slowing down though. My average pace from week 14 - 25 was between 8:33 and 8:43, but the last few weeks the average pace has slowed to 8:46 - 8:48. I would expect that at some point soon there will be another slow down. I'm surprised I haven't slowed more given the extra 16 pounds I'm lugging around. I guess I'm adapting well to being HUGE. Anyway, below you can see my stats. Oh, I almost forgot, I had my gestational diabetes test and I'm not diabetic. YAY! They also tested my iron levels and I'm not anemic either, so double yay!

Training Journal 5/24 - 5/30
Total Miles Run: 50.35
Total Time Running: 7:22
Average Running Pace: 8:46

Training Journal 5/31 - 6/6
Total Miles Run: 46
Total Time Running: 6:45
Average Pace: 8:48