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Toad Suck 10k 2009
Submitted by: Jim Ford - 05/15/09 4:40 pm

Toad Suck 10k 2009
On your mark, get set, GO! I competed in my first ever 10k race on May 9th during Conway's annual Toad Suck Daze. I've been running for health and fitness for a couple of years now but never really competed. I thought, why not challenge myself? See what I've got? I regularly run anywhere between 3 and 7 miles in my neighborhood several times a week, so 10 kilometers, or 6.2 miles shouldn't be difficult. I tried to prepare by planning on eating well and getting plenty of sleep several nights before. It didn't turn out that way, and the morning of the race I wondered if I'd make it to the starting line in time.

At the time I write this story, it has rained torrentially every day for two weeks. It began the night before the race. I awoke at 6:15 a.m. to a text message from one of my old church youth group friends asking, "think we're gonna race"? I text my neighbor who works for one of the race sponsors and volunteered for the event. He responded: It is on! The problem, it was raining so hard you could barely see outside. So my friend Debbie met me at the house and we geared up: shorts, under shirts, long sleeve t-shirts, hats, ipods under the shirts, socks, and expensive running shoes. We each had a race number pinned to our shorts and an electronic time tracking chip on our shoelaces. Threw some mini-muffins in our mouths and headed out to the starting point location.

We get there, surprised to see about 900 people standing in the fiercest rain I've seen in years. We were soaked within 10 seconds of waiting for the starting gun. After about 10 minutes, I wondered why in the hell I ever thought this was a good idea. Then BOOM, we're off. A few things if you've never raced to consider: 1. There's 900 people in your way and you can't bolt off at your normal pace for a while. 2. Stay calm and run your pace. Others bolt off and get tired and/or sick quickly and slow down or quit. 3. Running in a thunder/lightening storm gale .... well, it SUCKS! As we made our way through semi-blocked off city streets, we found ourselves in ankle deep water as the drainage system couldn't keep up. Lowering our heads into the wind to keep the rain from our eyes, we literally lept over what looked like raging and swirling river rapids where streets interconnected at an unfortunate slope. After a few miles of trotting along about my normal speed, I remembered this was a race and not my normal run through the neighborhood. So sadly I had to leave Debbie in the dust..err... the mud, and take off to about a 7.5 minute per mile pace to slice my time down. I begin passing dozens of folks who used too much of their energy early on. I'm getting closer and closer. The last mile, I sprint. I feel the muffins about to make a repeat appearance from my throat. My legs are strong but cold and wondering why I'm outside. My heart is even but thumping hard. The last corner into the highschool track and field. Goooosh! Into a foot of water! I see the clock at the finish line.... only 300 more yards..... closer...full sprint... I'm DONE! Hell yeah baby!

I waited for Debbie who was only a couple minutes behind me. She's quite fast and competed in a half marathon a couple months before. We're standing inside a field house soaking wet. Literally wringing our shirts and socks off. Several hundred people were packed inside and we were FREEZING. They were passing out juice, water, bananas, and other snacks. I saw a Kenyan who finished in about 30 minutes, who'd never been to Conway, Arkansas keenly eyeing the first place trophy. As we awaited the race results, I felt surprisingly... great! When I finally got my official time, 51 minutes and 36 seconds, I was kinda disappointed. But compared to many others who finished well into an hour and 15 minutes, it was cool.

I'll remember my own tips next year and hopefully shave a good 3 or 4 minutes off my time. Hopefully get it under 48 minutes. You never know what you can accomplish until you try... in the cold... in the rain... without food, sleep, or warm up. Heh heh. I wish the rain would stop, dang, it's been 2 weeks!

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