So on Saturday 10/25/2014, I got up before the sunrise and dragged myself to downtown Oviedo to run a 5k. My car's temperature gauge said it was 64F and I felt it. The runners gathered and about one quarter of them were wearing some sort of costume. Here's a horrible pre-dawn selfie.

After some stretching and announcements we were off.

My plan was to run 2 minutes and then recover (euphemism for walk) for 2 minutes but I only use this as a guide when running a race. After the first running interval I felt pretty good and I really wasn't out of breath so I decided to push myself and run through my first recovery segment. At the end of that recovery segment I re-evaluated myself again and I was doing great so I ran my second running interval. So for the first 6 minutes of the race I ran which gave me a lot of confidence.

Fast forward to about 30 minutes into the race and I was struggling a little with my breathing but other than that I felt strong. I wanted to run for the last 4-5 minutes but my will power wasn't there. when I was about a minute out (I saw the turn that led to the finish line) I kicked it into high gear and strode through the finish line.

My time is officially 35:00 and that is my personal best beating out my last record of 38:28 on 5/5/2012.

Here is the unofficial times that were posted.

My obligatory shirt with bib photo.

And these signs were all along the race route with little sayings taped on like "You like great!" and "You're doing awesome!"