I ran the 18th Annual HealthAmerica Jingle Bell Run for Arthritis today. It started at 1 PM with pretty miserable weather. It was in the 30s with rain/drizzle for the most part, but didn’t stop the holiday festivities…
Thankfully the rain stopped by the time the race started, but it was still on the cold and damp side. According the announcer, about a thousand people lined up the starting line today (including walkers), many with Santa hats and/or antlers, and almost all with jingle bells either pinned to their shirts or laced in their shoes. Some of the costumes were really amusing. :)
An air horn started the race right on time, and we were off.
I had heard this was a “fast” course, and I can see why. There was definitely a long, gentle hill in the first mile, but it wasn’t too bad, and the rest of the course was either level or a slight downhill.
As usual, I came out of the gates a little too fast and tried to get my pace under control. Felt pretty good for the first mile, but definitely lost some momentum in the second half of the race. I’m not sure if it was the cold or the dampness, but I felt like my lungs were working harder than usual. Either way, in no time I was heading back to the finish line.
My final (unofficial) time was about 26:12. According to my Garmin Forerunner (started closer to the starting line), I ran 3.17 miles in 26:08 (8:14/mi pace) with an average speed of 7.3 MPH and a max of 9.7 MPH. My 1-mile splits were 7:48, 8:32, and 8:30, with the last 0.17 at a 7:25/mi pace. Burned about 472 calories, which I promptly regained at Ruby Tuesday after the race.
Based on how the finish line was managed today, I don’t have high hopes of seeing any sort of official time being posted. But I’m OK with that. I’ve come to learn that any race that includes people in costume is not a race to worry too much about a few seconds in your finishing time. It was a good race for a good cause, and I definitely had a fun time.
That sucks… I usually am more anal about tracking my time. But, not today. I think you’re right though. I’m not confident they are going to post times any time soon (if at all). Anyhow, nice to see you today. We should get out for a run as soon as Nate is back in action.
Hey Eric:
Congrats on your “PR” today! And yeah, I’m up for a run whenever. Just let me know.
Hey John,
Sorry we didn’t get a chance to chat yesterday. That race was a lot of fun to watch, but that problem with the chutes was unacceptable. I was standing around listening to the race directors discuss how they were going to handle the large crowd and it was apparent this was the first time they thought about it. It was _REALLY_ poorly handled and they need to fix that for next year.
Nice report, John! That elf in the front row finished about 15 seconds in front of me…. he was a feisty one!
Nate:
I’d agree that, overall, the race wasn’t really organized that well. As soon as I got there I noticed that they had a total of five (5) porta-johns for roughly a thousand people. That’s never a good sign. And then the chutes at the end were a complete mess by the time I was finishing. Definitely a lot of room for improvement.
Marcus:
Yeah, gotta watch out for those elves! :)
We’ve never met, as far as I know. But I was in the Lancaster JBR, too. I stumbled on this site hoping to find myself in the background of a photo. (I was one of the walkers.)
Did you ever find your official time? Because they did post them eventually. Here’s the link (hope it works): http://lancasterjbr.kintera.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=243236
The names are in alphabetical order, so if you want to know age-group finish, you’ll have to figure it out for yourself. Good luck!