So it had been a little over a year since I found out about my back injury and stopped running. I figured out around Thanksgiving time (while we were in Tokyo) that I could actually run a little bit without making my back flare up, so I decided to sign up for a short race with my friends!! It was just a 3.5K race...short and sweet. I couldn't really 'train' for it since I was only running about 2-3 times a month, but heck, 3.5K shouldn't be hard to get through, right?!? Well, let me tell you something fun about Japanese races here in Okinawa. They like hills. And kids like to run too. The race was packed full of kids!! It was like 'dodge-a-kid' for the entire first half of the race...which was consequently downhill. And then the last part was uphill AND the race ended up on a hill higher than where the race started. We had a lot of fun at the race, and running around the kids is definitely something I will never forget!!
 |
| Lyndsey, Jill & I before the race |
 |
| Chris did the 10K-overachiever :) |
I think this was the start for the 10K. Add about 500 kids to the front of the line for the 3K...and a few hundred more people behind :)
We finished!! We got cool beach towels instead of race T-shirts. It was in English though. I thought I was finally going to get a cool race shirt with Japanese writing on it, but oh well :) I use the towel all the time now!
Oh, and ps, every race in Japan is called a 'marathon'...you just pick your distance like 2-3 months before the race! Races fills up so fast here that they don't have any same day registration...it has to be decided WAY far ahead.
No comments:
Post a Comment