Mexico Beach Community Garden Turkey Trot

Galina, Rick, Reese, Les, Bill, Kathy, Leksi

We spent last week in Florida for the annual Thanksgiving reunion.  I didn't take my laptop and just enjoyed beautiful weather, running, family, and lots of food!  A total of 59 family members, descendants of Earl and Marie McElhaney were in attendance.  We were literally kids from one to ninety-two - one of Les' aunts is 92 and a great grandson is one!

We ended up with seven family members running the Turkey Trot.  Les planned to walk/run with his dad.  His brother-in-law, Rick, and nephew, Reese, are fast and would be done before the rest of us.  I thought I might try to run it at a fast pace and see what would happen.  I had no pace strategy since I didn't know anyone in my age group who was running.

While we were waiting for the race to start, our two nieces decided they wanted to run with me.  (The race organizers didn't charge for kids, unless the parents wanted to pay.)  We don't see them very often, so my plans went out the window and I decided to just enjoy the family time.  Of course when the siren went off, both girls took off sprinting!  I wasn't worried about it, I just ran my own pace.

About a half mile in I caught Leksi as she was taking her first walk break.  We finished the first mile in 9:07, but I was pretty sure that wouldn't last.  "This is long," occurred during the second mile, but I have to say the girl is spunky!  She walked and ran the entire thing and didn't complain.  I tried doing run two minutes/walk 30 seconds intervals but that didn't seem to work.  I switched my strategy to blocks.  Run two blocks, walk one block.  They were really short blocks!  We also spent time doing fractions - "how much of three miles have we gone now?"

The mighty fisherwoman, later that same day!

We had one more turn before the finish line.  I told Leksi when we made the turn to sprint to the finish line and she did!  Our splits were 9:07, 10:47, 11:51, and 7:51 for the final tenth of a mile!  We finished in 32:49.

Les and his dad finished in 50:26.  My father-in-law wanted to finish in under 52 minutes.  Pretty awesome for an 83 year old!

They only gave out the top finisher in each age group, but only went to 60+.  Bill was the only one over 80, placing fifth of seven in the 60+ group.  He beat out a 65 year old and a 73 year old!

Reese took third in his age group (19 and under) and was 7th overall finishing in 21:25

I took third in my age group (50-59.) This was the first time I've ever placed in my age group.  The winner was only a couple minutes faster than me, I think I actually could have won it if I was running on my own!  But I don't regret spending those 32 minutes with my youngest niece, she may never want to run with me again.

Rick took first in his age group (40-49) and was 6th overall finishing in 20:57.  I'm pretty sure beating Reese by 28 seconds felt pretty good! All in all, a pretty decent showing for our family!

This was a fun race, only in it's third year.  In 2013 there were only 20 runners and no registration fee.  There were 165 finishers this year.  We paid $15 this year for the no t-shirt option.  There were runners, walkers, kids, strollers, and dogs.  I think it's what a Turkey Trot should be!