Saturday, August 2nd was the Venus on the Half Shell 5K Race in Dewey Beach and I was one of 322 participants who braved the slightly adverse weather conditions in order to say heck I ran. When I woke on Saturday, I wrote in my journal, August 2nd, sunny, 75 degrees, Race in Dewey… the family and I were on our yearly camping at the beach vacation …and while they all peacefully slept I was heading to the race.The last few days have been stifling… 90+ degrees with 90% humidity. The sheer thought of breathing was hard. So I was elated to see clouds in the distance… rain would be nice. Rain is good in my book. My parents always said to be careful of what you wish for….. in a matter of a half hour, the sunny turned cloudy and the sky opened up and it rained as though I should be collecting pairs of animals.. then to make sure you noticed… lightning and thunder were added in. ...oh not good.. rain is good….lightning and thunder… not good… this could either be a really long morning or a really short one…. I couldn’t even imagine how Wayne and Barb Kursh, the race directors would handle this one. ..you are either the good guys or bad guys. I think that no one really truly is happy so I really respect what they do.
While waiting for the determination on whether we would be canceling, delaying, or postponing the race, the storm let up enough for some of us to venture outside…. we had all been smushed up in the Venus on the Half Shell restaurant awaiting the storm out and well most runners get a bit antsy and I was one of them…. No sooner did a good portion of us get outside it started to pour again.. and we all like cattle moved back inside.. amazing HOW F- slow people move and these people are runners!
Back inside we awaited news from the directors …who much to my pleasure and surprise made mention that the race would go on and that it was up to each one of us to decide whether or not we wanted to run in the conditions… reminded us we signed waivers.. and good luck… Yes.. going to run in the torrential rain, thunder and lightning… ! We herd back outside and head up to the start. Wow Joe sure is missing out on this one…
Off we go… the rain now only a trickle… life was good. I found it very easy to get into a nice running rhythm , which by the way was almost immediately broken by someone who insisted on splashing and mashing into every puddle. G-d what an a-s……!! I normally ignore these types of people but I had to glance over to see what heathen was doing this.. not only was he going out of his way to hit every single puddle in the road.. he made sure to completely drench anyone around him… After a second look over I notice this was a little person.. a 9 years old.. awe how cute… ….. until he nailed me at the next puddle.. it’s not that I wasn’t wet.. because I was.. I just wasn’t THAT WET!!! And I do think I heard him giggle…
I tried to put this out of my mind .. but rounding the next corner there came upon a MAMOUTH puddle.. one so large it was unavoidable and while I know this little troll couldn’t wait to dretch all of us around him I couldn’t help but muster up a small smile when he entered the puddle and fell face first into it.. now a nice person would not have smiled.. and perhaps I am not nice but the first thing I thought of was it serves you right… you little heathen… ! [please note, he was ok…kids are fairly resilient].
The rest of the race went well I tried to keep up a 7.30 pace thinking gosh if Joe ever wants to qualify for Boston he has to keep up a 7.30 pace for his age group qualification for 26.2 miles.. jeez… good luck with that…
I finished quite strong.. although pulling my upper arm muscle during the sprint at the end.. don’t ask… who pulls an arm muscle in a leg race>?
Race Results
