KENTUCKY!!! NUMBER 8 ACROSS HOME PLATE!
This was another opportunity to see Jan! She has a house on the Ohio River and the month before when I was in Connecticut talking about my next race being in Louisville, she told me that I could stay at her house that is about 45 minutes from Louisville. How great is that!?! She wasn't sure that she would be there, but either way I could stay because her sister, Laura, lives next door and I could get the key from her. Well, Jan decided to go visit her sis and arrived a week before the race and was a gracious hostess. I brought my crew of one, Brian and Jenn signed up for the 10K so she came along as well. We picked Brian up at work on our way out of Chicagoland and hit loads of traffic and lost an hour because we cross into a new time zone so we didn't get there until 10:30, but we made it! Our race was at 7:45am (felt like 6:45am to us) so we all got up early and let Jan sleep in, she had promised to make us breakfast when we got back, so we got going around 6:15 and didn't have a lot of time to spare. We barely got lined up and barely got warmed up and we were off. It was cold, at about 34 degrees at the start. The sun peaked out a couple three times, but it never did get very warm. It was uneventful. I did not stop at any watering station, had a gel at 5 and gummies at 8. I felt good, but cold and never did take off my gloves. It was fairly flat with really interesting architecture in the later part of the race. The best part was the last bit when we ran into the center field of Louisville Slugger Field, home of the bats and ran the warning track around to finish at home plate. Brian filmed it and I didn't look like I was dead. In fact...it was my best time at 01:52:13, 187 of 799 total runners, 46 of 440 female runners, 3rd in my AG of 26 (50-54). Jenn did great too at 1:16. We made our way back to Jan's and had quiche and coffee and salads and took a hik

e all over her property and then had a fabulous meal with her and her sister Laura and her husband Eric. It was a great race and a great visit!!!
PS: I just found out I get a Louisville slugger bat that is engraved with my states! How cool is that?!?