Are You Faster Than a Pastor?

In the midst of our town's Sweet Corn Festival, there is (the centerpiece, in my mind) a 5K road race, the Ken Keener Classic. A couple of weeks ago I stumbled upon the "brilliant" idea to challenge the congregation to race me. Well, it wasn't really a challenge as much as a chance to do something in the community and invite others to participate. I asked the question "Are you faster than a pastor?"

Today was the race...

When I got my race packet, the first thing I noticed was that my number was 10. That was always my soccer number, so I was psyched. I ran a quick warm-up and stretched at the start line.

After the gun, I jumped out fast (6:11 first mile) and found a good rhythm for the second mile (13:05). In the last mile, my pastor friend Blaine caught up with me. My personal goal of this run was really to beat Blaine and Scott, both fellow United Methodist pastors and avid runners, and here was Blaine, ready to beat me. So I kept pace and sprinted him at the end.

My final time: 20:42. This was 25 seconds faster than I ran at the Lancaster Festival 5K last month. 25 seconds! I was second in my age group.

Once I finished, I turned right around and ran back to find Tara, Jonathan, and Andrew. This was Jonathan's first 5K run! They were bringing up the rear (the "sag wagon" from the fire department was no little distraction for the little guy) with Andrew in the stroller. Once I showed up, Jonathan was much more amenable to running. We mostly had short "races" - down hills, to the next cone, etc. He liked the water stops a lot, too. It was really cute to see him running his little heart out to the finish line!

When we finished, they were already starting the door prizes. We each got one, including a free admission to next year's Baltimore Festival 5K and a coupon for a free ice cream cone at Weldon's Ice Cream (one of our favorite places in Millersport). It was a good day in the Thiefdom!