THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO BRING TO A RUNNING RACE?

Not your shorts or your shirt or your watch or even your shoes.

I'm now convinced it's Body Glide.

I did forget my shoes though...or, I forgot my light-and-therefore-fast shoes, so I had to race in my trainers...which is actually fine because now I don't have to deal with blisters, and let's face it - the couple of seconds the other shoes would have saved me don't really matter at all.

I ran the Freehold St. Paddy's Day 10 mile Race this morning, and considering my lack of running lately, I'm pretty happy with the way it went.

The chaffing, though? That's not so cool. I won't be able to wear jeans for at least a few days...and how am I supposed to be a college student without jeans?!?

Anyway, the weather was chilly at first, but ended up being perfect for running. I wore shorts (hence the need for Body Glide) and a long sleeve t-shirt, but I really could have been in a t-shirt once I started running. It was about 35-40 degrees and sunny, with almost no wind. The course was rolling, but there was only one hill that made me groan. The last 2 miles were mostly downhill, and I believe I managed a negative split, with my last mile coming in at 7:36 (and since my 5k pace is 7:26, that's pretty much as fast as I was going to be able to go). According to my watch, I finished in just over 1:22. The only other 10m race I've ran was last year, and I did it in 1:20, but at that point I had been hard-core marathon training with lots of speed work, so I'm kind of pleasantly surprised that I can run at an 8:15 pace for 10 miles right now.

My drinking water while racing skills are getting a little bit better, although plastic cups are harder to handle than paper ones, and I still had to slow down a bit and I kind of choked at one point.

It was nice to race; I haven't really ran since the Philadelphia Marathon, I think. Although, when I was in the midst of it, I was definitely thinking 'What the hell? This is stupid. I'm never doing this again. I just want to ride my bike at a reasonable pace and not feel like I'm going to puke.' But you know, afterwards it feels great and sprinting across the finish line makes you feel like you really accomplished something.

The Obligatory Splits:
mile 1 - 8:19
mile 2 - 8:16
mile 3 - 8:26 (water)
mile 4 - 8:17
mile 5 - 8:07
mile 6 - 8:24 (water and hill)
mile 7 - 8:08
mile 8 - 8:15 (water)
mile 9 - 8:12
mile 10 - 7:36

total - 1:22:05 (but I was like 30 or so seconds behind the start line, so the official results will probably be a bit slower)

Oh, and the post-race food? Hot Dogs, Bagels, Donuts, Apples, Coke, and Beer...couldn't be better, really...