2009 cook your buns 3 miler: race report

the "cook your buns" 3 miler at tod's point in greenwich is one of my favorite family friendly races - and i had planned to run it w/katie. but, in a reversal from last year, katie decided to skip "cook your buns" and run the norwalk summer series 3 miler the next morning. it rained on and off during the day, which didn't bode well for race night conditions. amazingly, the sun broke through the grey skies around 4 o'clock and we had great weather for the race.

i ran an easy 3 miles before i got in the car for the drive to greenwich. at the parking booth i asked where the relocated start was - and he said just follow the 300(!) cars in front of you, then you can't miss it. the late breaking sunshine contributed to a record turnout. i had to park about a quarter mile from the start because of the crowd. after i picked up my race number and shirt, i saw kate and tom (who had just done the chase corp. challenge in central park the night before). and we were soon joined by john,

minutes later, emmy arrived debating whether she would or would not run the race tonight. she had run earlier in the day, had her camera w/her to take pictures, and wanted to save herself for the norwalk 3 miler the next morning. amazingly - and this is a rare occurrence - emmy sat out a race. she tried that once before at a cook your buns a couple of years ago - and jumped in the race at the last second and ran it w/camera in hand! this time she jogged a little and took pictures as we transitioned from the road to the beach portion of the course.

the start was a bit confusing. we lined up behind the banner - only to discover the race would take off in a perpendicular direction. i found myself at the back of the pack as we took off across the field. it took some zig-zagging, but i managed to thread my way through the crowd. it took me a solid 7:34 to run that first mile. mile two, way less crowded, took a more realistic 6:49 to run. in what turned out to be a short last mile, i finished up w/a 6:01 (half of which run on the sandy shore) and crossed the finish in 20:23.

i went straight from the chute to the food line! i had two burgers and some watermelon on my plate before i even cracked open a bottle of water to rehydrate! i had already eaten one burger and the watermelon before emmy snapped the above photo. afterwards, at a much more relaxed and civilized pace, john, his wife, kate, tom, emmy and i sat at a picnic table to eat (and mickey surprised us w/a couple of coronas from his nearby cooler!).

as always, a great event :D

here are my race photos.