Run The Woodlands 5K #189 Race Report

I guess I'll begin working my way backward on this past weekend. It might be the best way to remember everything. :)

Run The Woodlands 5K was the last race in the Montgomery County Triple this past Saturday. (And yes, we raced in all of that rain and cold weather!) It was going to be a busy day for me as I needed to be able to get out of The Woodlands by a certain time to be able to take the medals for the kids that would be participating in HARRA's Just For Kids Fun Run.

By the time I got to The Woodlands with Waverly, Bill already had The Woodlands Running Club tent set up and Karen was just arriving with all of the pine cone awards that we all made at Rick's house the afternoon before.

It was just absolutely incredible to watch all of the people begin to show that we saw the day before at the City of Conroe's Turkey Trot 5K. They were there to run in the rain and 45 degrees temperature for a small piece of wood with three (3) pine cones hot glued to it.

But it wasn't about a tangible award, it was about instilling some "intangible" thing in people to get out, do something different and have fun.

Woodlands Fit organizer Rich Cooper registered (which involves dropping a $1 in the box and signing a waiver) and made the comment of the day saying, "It's pine cone time, baby!" I'm glad that he was comfortable making it because that is what will be in black and white in the Conroe Courier on Tuesday.

We welcomed Cindy Jones, who is involved with the first annual Davy Crockett Bear Chase Marathon and Half Marathon, to come out and speak to the runners about their race in Groveton on Saturday, April 12, 2008. She was giving away a free marathon or half marathon entry to one of the finishers - chosen at random.

Then Ken Johnson surprised me. He thought that the Huntsville Half Marathon was giving away an entry on Saturday as well, but we intended for the Seven Hills Running Club-produced event to do so for the spring version of the MC3. Ken stepped up and sold his race saying, "Since it is so cheap to enter our race, we'll give away an entry today."

Wow! So we had two free entries and two copies of Dana-Sue Crews' book, "Our Daddy's Cancer," to give away!

We all got out in the rain and, of course, many of the usual suspects (i.e. runners) were there including the Van Kuikens (Gary and Denise), Ann Leoni, Carlos Ortegon, Jim Braden (his wife, Karen, helped out as always), Vincent Attanucci and his son, Matthew, and then there were numbers of regulars doing the Triple including Mike Mendeck, Stephen Smith, Debbie Tripp and so on. It was good to see Tom Sherwood and Wayne Rutledge. They showed me a picture of their Clear Lake Falcons high school cross country team that was coached by none other than, Dan Green.

As we got lined up and started, I made a willful decision to simply run the race with Ken. It was a good run, and one that was almost done on a completely even pace. Check out these splits:

Mile 1 -- 10:50.84
Mile 2 -- 11:04.66
Mile 3 -- 11:08.25
Last .1 -- 1:07:01
Total -- 34:10.76

I could have gone out and tried to run as hard and as fast as I could (having put down a few sub 10-minute miles on Thursday), but this was an enjoyable run for me. Plus I knew that as soon as I got in that I would need to be worried about getting people together for the grand Pine Cone ceremony.

And speaking of the "grand Pine Cone ceremony", it really went incredibly well despite a couple of big fears of mine.

While I realize that this was about a "2 x 4 with three pine cones" on it, people still, I believe, expected us to be very organized. Besides, to do this, they spent anywhere from $16-$21 more than what they might have this weekend - plus gas to and from. Therefore, they expected something to be delivered of some intrinsic value.

There were also people there that didn't know me all that well (for example, Rich Cooper of Woodlands Fit) or we they were our guests there (Cindy Jones of the Bear Chase Marathon). I was also representing HARRA, The Woodlands Running Club as well as Bill Dwyer. So I put a lot of pressure on myself to "perform". I thanked everybody once again and promised that I would try to get through things as quick as possible because it was cold (plus I needed to get to Memorial Park!) However, I didn't feel that I rushed anything.

We drew for the two race entries. I had Karen Felicidario's daughter, Emma, draw the popsicle sticks out of a bag to award these. We took pictures and then this is where things got a little dicey - and not in a bad way, at all.

I had purchased two copies of Dana-Sue's book about her husband's Bill's battle against lymphoma. Instead of me trying to re-tell it, this is what is on the family's web site:

"Our Daddy's Cancer: How We Helped Him Fight"
by our mom, Dana-Susan Crews

When our dad was diagnosed with blood cancer in October 2003, we were scared. But we learned that we are pretty tough kids and we helped our daddy fight his terrible disease. He beat cancer and we're so proud of him. Our mom wrote down some of the things we did and said when our dad was sick. We hope that our story will help other kids and even grown ups fight against their troubles and win.

Anna just had something on her blog about defying you not to cry. Reading that bit above, I make the same challenge. And guess what happened when I was introducing Dana-Sue, Bill and their kids, Morgan and Dylan. You guessed it. I choked up and couldn't hold back a tear or two. The one thing that I remember saying is, "These are good people." And they are. They're competitive and talented. (They're both training for Ironman Arizona.) But they are also as sweet of people that you're ever going to meet.

I got through it. We drew a couple of more names. They autographed the books for the winners and we proceeded. [The one mistake that I made, and it wasn't noticeable ... it is just that I missed a little bit of a nice touch is that I had Morgan and Dylan only draw one of the two names. It was because Emma was doing such a nice job!]

We proceeded then to recognize each finisher from where they finished that day at Run The Woodlands 5K. I think I said, "The faster you were, the bigger pine cones you get to choose!"

I tried to say something about each individual that came up. Some I knew very well and others I didn't know at all; however, I tried to make each one feel special.

When Karen came up to get her award, it hit me - Emma met the requirements by running both 1-milers and helping us all out so wonderfully. So I paused, picked out an award for her and recognized her so that she and her Mom could get their picture taken together.

After we went through all of the finishers, I got a chance to recognize Bill and Andrew Perry for their efforts (and I got to raz Bill for his 5K DNF from last year.) But this year, Bill finished the Turkey Trot 5K and got to run with his daughter, Keriann. Good stuff! (Mick Long, who works at Luke's Locker and helped Andrew set the tower up at the first two races and RD Run The Woodlands, had already left.)

And who did I forget to recognize out of all of this? Waverly! She got her award, but after everybody else had started to leave.

I couldn't help Bill, Debbie and Stephen Smith take the TWRC tent down because I needed to head south to Memorial Park. However, if I had checked my voice mail, I would have received a note from Christopher Rampacek that the Just For Kids Fun Run had been cancelled due to torrential rains that were taking place down in Houston.

Nonetheless, we made the drive, saw Erin Foley (who had been there since 8:30 a.m. to make sure potential participants and the entertainment knew that it had been cancelled) and then after visiting with her for a few minutes, we ate breakfast at IHOP on Washington and I-10.

To see more about the Montgomery County Triple, please click here.
To see pictures of the event from Debbie Tripp, please click here.