31:54

"Oh my God running sucks!" I huffed between irregular breathes as I trotted up a mild incline on Ocean Drive. Meanwhile packs of children and an older woman passed me by, seemingly unaware of how difficult and not fun running is. Losers. Freaks, all of them.

So today I ran my first race, a 5K. 3-point-whatever miles. And while its easy to think all I got out of it was twenty less dollars in my account and four hours less sleep, there was actually some greater good that came out of it. Let's recap:

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The Goodwill "Sun Run" wasn't my idea, but it was proposed to me far enough in advance that I thought, surely I'll be more than ready for it when the time comes. Well, the last few weeks have not be great running weeks for me. There was the shin splints and the crazy work schedule and the moving across town and a host of other excuses that kept disrupting my running schedule. Before I knew it, it was race week and I was questioning whether I should even participate. Not only have I yet to run that far outside, but it cost $20. Do you know how much crap I could buy at Goodwill for $20?

Anyway, I was extremely nervous last night and this morning, and I had a ton of answered questions. What should I eat the night before? Should I eat breakfast? What should I wear? Where do I pin my race number? What's the course like? Why do runners like to get up so damn early? I rolled out of bed at 6:30 a.m., ate half a balance bar and headed to my first race.

My friend had bailed on the whole thing, so it was just me. I think I may have preferred it that way any way, although it would have been fun to have some one there to mock all the running freaks. There was short-shorts guy, spandex women and a host of other colorful people. A community 5K hardly brings out the elite athletes, but there were still a few intimidating runners there. Just keep to your routine, I thought. I did a little warm up walking and my regular stretching and I was as ready as I could be.

I can't tell you how exciting it was. As they counted down the seconds and the pack slowly started to move I got this fantastic rush. The music on my mp3 player started to swell, runners jockeyed for position and I felt such a connection with the whole heard of running freaks.

That lasted only a few minutes. Mostly, the race was about me trying to not think. Stop thinking about running, stop thinking about how far you've gone, stop thinking about how far the turn around is, stop thinking about how much time has passed, stop thinking about not thinking about running. It was much more of a mind game then I realized. Combine that with the actual running (which sucks), and the bulk of the experience was about as unenjoyable as I imagined.

But what made it all worth it was that last dash, those glorious last few yards where you see the finish line and all the people and know you have done what you set out to do. I turned up my music, picked up my pace, and totally smoked that 10 year-old boy that kept wandering in front of and behind me in the last half of the race. I wanted to scream "eat it, Kid!" when I finished, but I refrained. It was fantastic.

I still think the time was wrong. That, or the length was shorter than advertised, because I finished with a time of 31 minutes and 54 seconds. That shouldn't have happened. Especially since I did briefly break and walked for a short bit. But now I have a time, a (sort of) official race time to beat, to use as my marker, to tell people so they know my approximate running ability.

31:54

My new ID and entry code into the world of running freaks.