Jessica's first 10K!: Race report

When your very cool, quite-a-bit younger former co-worker asks you to run with her in her first 10K race, naturally, you say yes.

After, of course, immediately feeling like, wow, did she text the wrong person?

Surely she meant to ask one of her equally hip, fashionable and fun friends with whom she's seen on Facebook having cute cocktails in cute outfits -- at a time of night you're definitely in already in your pajamas.

OK, she's a mom, now, too, but she hasn't totally thrown in the towel. Let's just say I traded heels for running shirts awhile ago.

Sigh.

But my former (and one of my favorite) Sun-Times co-worker DID ask me and I was like, yeah, baby, sign me up!

So we registered for Esprit de she, the girliest race ever.

I got roped into this race last year, too, for a dear running friend's bachelorette party. It was quite fun. Prosecco is a nice post-race drink, I discovered. It goes well with giggling, sweaty women done with their run for the day.

Jess and I met downtown after work and took (naturally) the CTA to our destination. (Nerd alert: I love transit and love it even more since I became a spokeswoman for it nearly three years ago.)

It was one of those perfect, perfect summer nights. The humidity was low, the air was warm, the sky was pinkening and people milling around pre-race were cheerful. Jessica was nervous but I kept reassuring her that she would be fine. She promised me some f-bombs and I was like, cool.

Like dorks, we couldn't figure out where the start line was (though we found the alcohol wrist band line with no trouble).

Finally, we lined up and boom, we were off!

So, I had run 12 miles before work the previous morning and had a high-mileage week the prior week, so I was kind of pooped. I was counting on settling in and just running easy.

Not Jessica.

Like a determined little bat out of hell, she was booking and all business. I'm like, um, why are we going so fast?

She argued, we weren't fast, we were slow. I told her we were sub-10-minute miles and we ought to take it easy in the beginning. I didn't want to be too bossy -- but I remember wanting to barf up a lung during my first 10K race.

She settled in and did great. We did a short walk around mile 4 (which is the furthest she had ever run before, yay!) so she could settle her breathing. It was definitely warm. My shirt and shorts were soaked in sweat.

I sweat like a dude. Always have.

We continued running. I figured, I should just talk, and you know, distract her. I blathered about my kids, like how my 4-year-old daughter asks "why" in response to everything I say, and how my my 6-year-old howls like Bart Simpson if he sees his sister's butt while I'm getting them dressed in the morning.

And he doesn't know who Bart Simpson is.

We got to mile 5 and I was in full cheerleader mode. She had this! She was pretty quiet, maybe a little grunty. But she was chugging along.

Finally, we saw the finish line and we both took off. She did it! So happy for her!

The post-race is all chick stuff. Get your nails done, put a girly fake tattoo on your arm that says something inspirational, stuff your face with lemon Luna bars... or hit the sangria bar, like we did. A highly recommended post-run drink, so I'm told by no one.

Congratulations, Jessica!

Next stop, 10-mile race? :-) I'll check my calendar...