Great Tuesday - UPDATED 8/27/09

Kent and I decided last week that we would join the other Pine Belt Pacers at the Longleaf Trace in Hattiesburg to do a "partner run". It was different from anything we'd done. Having a race to train for is one thing, but we thought this would put a spark in our running. Unfortunately due to the weather reports forecasting rain, it was postponed to the following Tuesday (this week). But since it didn't rain but many of the locals still got together. Kent and I practiced running together once last week and then again the actual day of the run. (I added a couple more miles to my run while Kent swam. This made 6 miles for me and 4 for him for Tuesday.) Prior to the race, Christy T. taught us some core exercises (Pilates) which is especially good for runners. It builds abdominal muscle strength which are the ones that actually "move" your body. I thoroughly enjoyed these. I do a few core exercises myself but took advantage of learning some different ones. Thanks, Christy!


The rules of the run were:
1. No running watches.
2. No iPods. (This one was hard for me!)
3. Must run with your partner AND cross the finish line together.
4. Predict your running time for the partnership.

The object of this race was to see who could come closest to guessing how long it would take them to run the two miles together, so it didn't matter who crossed the finish line first. How cool is this! We put our prediction on the chart and off we went. As with any race, we seemed to start out faster than our norm, but we stayed together. Since it was held at 6:00 p.m. and with the recent cool front gracing our area, the temp was great.

We couldn't believe how close some guessed. The winning partners came within 3 seconds of their estimated run time! I believe this is correct. WOW...great job ladies! Here are the winners:


I'd love to do this again...how fun! After the run, we enjoyed some delicious food. Pizza was brought in and some brought complimentary foods. There was a great black bean and corn salad and a wonderful squash casserole brought...yummy!! I could have eaten these all by myself, but resisted...kinda! Frank B. was kind enough to take our picture...eating, of course!!


We really enjoyed the evening and loved the fellowship. Everyone is so nice. They encourage you whether you are a seasoned runner or a novice. What great people! To see all of the pictures, go to the Pine Belt Pacers web site.

This is the end of the summer and I think next week is the end of their weekly Tuesday runs. I hate that we didn't participate in more, but there's always next year and something to look forward to.