Hilly Hobble 10K

This is going to be a bit of a boring race recap - I don't have any photos! The horror!

The Hilly Hobble is a quintessential tiny, local race in the town that my parents grew up in. My uncle is the race organizer, it costs $5, my mom and aunt do the timing with one stopwatch for 3 different race distances and start times. There were 49 participants spread over the 3 distances - 10K, 5K and a kid's 2K race.

Last year, Emily and I ran the 5K as our first race together, and only my second 5K ever. It was AWFUL - I wasn't well prepared for the distance, it was hilly and it was just awful. However, this year was a different story!

I decided to run the 10K this year - I knew I could handle the distance, but I had never seen the course and didn't know what the hills would be like. The 10K started at 6:30 with 11 people. We ran totally on the side of the road, but the roads were pretty quiet. The first 2.5 miles were VERY hilly - and by hilly I mean just straight up hill. There were small reprieves for a minute or 2 of flatter spots, but we were basically going up hill for almost the first half of the race.

I was obviously at the back of the pack for the whole race, but I did start off with someone behind me - he passed me within the first mile, but he started walking on the last hill, so I slowly hobbled past him, giving him the thumbs up as I went by. As we started on the second half of the race, I left the guy in my wake and really cruised - I truly have never felt that strong during a run. Granted, it was mostly all downhill, but I just really felt amazing!

I crossed the finish line at a PR of 1:02...with the hills I was pretty pleased with my time! It was good for top 10 in the 10K (so there were only 11...who cares?!) and second in my age group (out of 2...but whatever!). I had a great race and I loved participating in this family affair!