September Races (besides my half)

Is it bad that I had to look at old posts to see if I actually posted about the races I did in September outside my half?

Late September, M3S Sports puts on a pretty cool race along with the Oktoberfest at the fairgrounds, the Oktoberfest Meiler Vier.  Basically it is 2 laps around the fairgrounds following the tapping of the keg.  Your goodie bag is pretty awesome: coupons for a brat and cream puff from Schmidt's and a beer to be enjoyed as soon as you are done racing!  Pretty awesome!  I was all too happy to say yes to pacing this race this year!  I love the idea of a Friday night race too!! We were assigned to pace a 14 minute per mile finishing in 56 minutes.  We came in just under - 55:44.  I was pretty happy with that!  The best part was someone who passed by us as we finished and thanked us for being there - we were keeping her in line the whole race and she was able to muster up enough to finish ahead of us and beat the time she had hoped for!  I love pacing and it was awesome to finally have someone thank us instead of acting like we have the plague!  After the race I got to hang out with some of the Lucky 13's from MIT who are becoming my friends and biggest supporters:

I am excited to be a part of this group!

If you go to the M3S Sports page for Oktoberfest I linked to above, you'll see Judi on the right hand side after the Charity Newsies logo.  Picked up some more bling along the way:

Not sure if I like this year's or last year's medal better.

2010 Medal. Which do you like better?

After the race, it was home to relax as we had 11 miles on the schedule with MIT the next morning.  It was a lot of miles but I was able to enjoy it with multiple walkers from my group and I got to finish up the mileage with 2 of the new walkers and 1 returning walker.  This was the first time I've ever seen a pace car to help us finish up miles! Judi's mom is walking her first half at Columbus and she decided to follow us back to the school as we finished.  The story there is pretty cool and I know I'll blog about it soon.  Then again, it'll be hers to tell on her blog.

Sunday was officially my last race for race club.  It was the EAS 5K or 10 miler.  I decided to do just a 5K there because of the miles I had already done that weekend.  There were only 27 people in the race and I am pretty sure I was the only person who walked the whole thing but either way, they handed me a plaque as I finished that said "First Female Walker 5K:"

Does the award count if there were no other competitors?

Group picture with 3 other ladies who finished up the 5K with me:

Me, Liberty, Laura & Kristen

My official race time for EAS was 38:25.  I was pretty happy with that - even if it wasn't a PR.  My music died during the race and we walked (or ran) through a lovely trail out at Three Creeks in Groveport that I've not been on before.  I was glad for the change from Olentangy Trail.  We are really lucky here in Columbus to have as many metro parks as we do to exercise on.

Are there any fall races in your area that are a must do for you every year?  Do you have nice, paved trails to walk or run on like we do here?