Ready to race!

This Sunday I'll be running my first race of 2011, and my second since giving birth to my son in October. I'm running the HMRRC Winter Marathon Relay, taking on the first leg -- 9.2 miles. Fortunately, the weather looks like it will be better than it was last year, with the forecast calling for a high of 32 and only light wind (not nearly as nice as it has been the past few days but I'll take it).

Even more fortunate, I'm again running the relay with Amanda and Suzy! AND my friends Bridget, Janis and Melissa are also running on teams. Let's call it a running party, friends.

I've gone back and forth on how to run this race. Part of me thinks I should treat it as a long run and settle in to a nice, easy pace, keeping my eye on the half marathon in 6 weeks. Then, there's that other part of me. The part that says, "Hey, a race is a race and this one is as legitimate as that half you're training for. Race on, Happy Runner."

I'm inclined to listen to that other part.

But I also don't want to jeopardize my training by pushing too hard so I've come up with what I believe is a good compromise: I'll try to run my leg of the race at (what I hope will be) my half marathon pace. Since the race is just 4 miles shorter than the half marathon it should give me a good idea of how I'll handle the pace over the longer distance. I plan to test out my half marathon fueling plan on Sunday, too. I guess this race will be a bit of a half-way test.

I'm excited. I feel like my running is much better than it was when I ran my first post-preggo race in the beginning of December. I hope that proves to be the case!

Have a great weekend, everyone. Good luck to everyone who is racing!

~ Felice