5K and a medal to prove it! :-)

What can I say??? I am finding it a little difficult to articulate how today felt. I actually just ran in a real race and I finally got to meet our blog buddy Lynn all in the same day!

Two years ago this very weekend, I was lying in a hospital bed with a broken hip, broken foot and soft tissue injuries and I weighed 240lbs. My life was turned upsidedown and I had a long road to recovery ahead of me. Although I haven't seen the end of that road, crossing today's finish line was nothing short of poetic justice in my mind.

As you can imagine, I was all excited and nervous about the race firstly, AND I sort of felt like I had a blind date lined up! lol But as soon as I laid eyes on her I knew it was her and she didn't feel like a stranger to me in the least. She is as cute as a button, let me tell you all that! This is me talking on the phone with her for the first time! lol FH was there ready to take my pic right when she called!

So here we are super pumped to get ready to line up for our race. The 10K-ers were lining up for their start I think:

So here's me screwing up my face for some reason or another and Lynn hardly able to get that cute smile off her face!
Here's where Tasha is attemping to take some candid shots of us talking game strategy and me trying to "act natural" for the "candid" shot that I know she's taking! lol I look like I'm ready to run out onto a football field!
Here's my Bib:
And here's Lynn's Bib:

It was pretty tough for Tasha and the FH to get many good shots of us, but here we are at the start of the race. We ended up pretty far in the back of the pack which kind of sucked a bit because we were behind a lot of walkers that we had to manoever around for the first few minutes. I'm actually glad that I decided to wear my blue running hoodie-shirt instead of the shirt in our race pack so that I can be seen more easily in the crowd! It's hard to find anyone!

Here we are again and I am again fiddling with my iPod earbud trying to get going through the crowd:

Tasha and FH were in prime spot to take finish line pictures and were made to move only seconds before I crossed the finish line (booooo), but they got me a little further after I got the medal. How happy am I??? I didn't know they were going to be belting out names over the microphone when you got to the finish line and it totally pumped me up when I heard him say my name! I thought it had to have been another Angela at first because I wasn't quite there at the end yet!

Can you believe that Tasha bought me a bouquet of flowers that she gave me at the finish line!!!!! What an unbelievably sweet thought that was! I was walking around with the flowers feeling like I had actually won the race! lol (I did win though - in my head anyways! lol)

And Tasha and I in the Metro Centre after the race trying to see if we can find Lynn and Sarah G and the other girls we were with. No such luck! Although I am now made aware that esspressomama saw me there and didn't come and say hello! lol

What else.....oh I'm not sure of my exact chip time as of yet, but I started my iPod Nike+ thing right when I was crossing the start line and as soon as I thought to stop it after I crossed the finish line and it said 34:47 I think. Which isn't too shabby I don't think. I also know now for sure now that my Nike+ attachment needs to be calibrated because it thought I had run 5.48kms! I've been running less than 5K every time up to this point ---booooo----so hopefully I can calibrate it and make it a bit more accurate for next time.

So all in all today will be one of the most memorable days of my life. I am beaming with pride.

Edit: Official Results:

Place: 432/803
Bib#5025
Time: 35:44.6
Chip Time: 34:12.7
Pace: 7:09
Category: Open Women
Place: 117/246
Gender Place: 230/523

Yayyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!!