Waiting for the start

Daniel signed up to run a 5K – his first – on St. Patrick’s Day in Tacoma.  He had never run that far (3.2 miles), but trained for a couple weeks and was confident he could make it.  David did not sign up because he had a soccer tournament scheduled.  When the tournament was canceled at the last minute, he signed up to run the 1K “Fun Run.”

The 5K start was an incredible mass of people.  There were 1,691 people of all ages and body types running the race.  Fortunately, Daniel was able to start up near the front with the other fast runners.  The weather was cold and wet, with rain and snow mixed – not exactly running weather.  The course started out downhill toward the waterfront so the runners had to finish by coming back up the hill.  We really didn’t know what to expect from Daniel, but his track coach figured he’d finish with a time near 20 minutes (an excellent time, especially for a kid).  Daniel finished in 19:43, which put him first in the 14-and-under age group (out of 45 runners) and 19th overall (out of 1,691).  Amazing!

David then lined up for the fun run and looked a bit out of place.  All the other runners were smaller kids, but he just kept a smile on his face and set about to run as well as he could.  The 1K was not timed, but he ran hard and enjoyed himself.  Next time (June 9), he’ll be running the 5K with Daniel.

On the video, we wanted to show the entire starting group of the 5K, but it just kept going and going and… well, let’s just say it got a bit boring so we cut it very short.  The finish was exciting, as he passed a couple people near the end of the race.  To see more pictures, click the one above.  We picked through them to reduce the number.