The seventh official meet up of the Cleveland chapter of the Ohio Blogging Association is in the books! Not only did we meetup for a great cause, it was also held in conjunction with the first official nationwide FitBloggin’ Local meetup!
Those in attendance on Saturday the 9th included:
- Alicia from Poise in Parma (that’s me!)
- Amanda from Clue into Cleveland (it was her 1st 5K! her race recap is HERE!)
- CLEgal from WhyCLE (her race recap is HERE!)
- Courtney from Hip and Healthy
- Craig from Waiting For Next Year
- Jess from mojamala2 (her race recap is HERE!)
- Kali from Finishing Firsts (her race recap is HERE!)
- Molly from Mollyberries’ Hodge Podge (her race recap is HERE!)
- Morgan from Becoming Rooks (her race recap is HERE!)
- Ryan – a contributor to Cleveland Hops & @CLECraftBeerRun
- Stephanie from Hungry in Cleveland
Held at the Tri-C Western Campus in Parma, we arrived bright and early at The American Cancer Society Parma Area Relay for Life “Run for the Pierogies” 5K. We knew we were in for a flat course:
:
(picture source: that note says “will do the course x2 and then finish on the other side of the circle)
…but I’m not sure if we were all ready for the heat and humidity! With a 9:00AM start, we were all pretty sweaty by the time we were done with those 3.1 miles!
Me with Ryan (that man is a running machine) and my unofficial running coach Kali.
I FINALLY got to meet Morgan – hurray for Parma bloggers!
As for the run: it was an interesting one. I was tempted by the idea of a PR on an uber flat course, so I decided to try out a 4 minute run/1 minute walk plan. Everything was going smashingly through the first two miles. As I ran by the second mile marker, the man yelled “21:28” and I was ecstatic. A two mile PR for me!
Ah, but the celebration was quickly cut short when the side stitch from hell attacked my right side. I was reminded that I had a five mile long run on the schedule for tomorrow, so I committed to walking through it. It took me until the third mile marker, but with the finish line in sight I sucked it up and ran to a finish right around the 36 minute mark. Absolutely fine by me!
With another 3.1 miles in the books, I celebrated as only as those from Parma should: by eating pierogies:
…well, I didn’t eat them (there were no gluten free pierogies for some reason), so Team PIP’s official taste tester did:
That’s one happy race spectator. I was so happy to see the tag line of this blog finally come true!!
To continue the party, we headed over to Luna’s Deli Restaurant in Parma Heights for a solid Saturday morning breakfast. Discussion topics included how ridiculously humid it was, our thoughts on the social media reaction to the Casey Anthony verdict, the plethora of food and beer events this summer and our general love for hanging out with one another. Good times all around!
LONG STORY SHORT: While chugging my post-race coffee and enjoying some make-shift savory oats, I looked around the table to see the glow of healthy, happy Clevelanders. It was great to see life long runners along with brand new ones gather for a Saturday morning race. It just proves that you can take up a healthy life style at any point in your life. Why not make that moment today?
Want to join the OBA fun in August? Don’t worry – I won’t make you run again! On Thursday, August 11th, OBA will head to Progressive Field to watch our Cleveland Indians take on the Detroit Tigers! Check out the OBA Facebook event page for more details!
Even though it was hot, humid, and I ran a crappy race, it was still fun!! Sorry I missed brunch :9 but looking forward to the Tribe game in August!
[...] Poise in Parma (read her recap here) [...]
Always great to see you! Thanks for organizing another fab event!
I wish I could have made the brunch, would have loved to discuss the Casey Anthony verdict. Great to see you and thanks for organzing everyone to get together.
So great to finally meet faces!
This is great! Glad ya’ll had such fun!
someday soon i’m going to be a real running coach, haha. thanks again for organizing a get-together for all of us!
Great race. Wish I was there. See you guys Saturday at Shot in the Dark?
Dear Runners:
I want to thank all of your for coming out to the first annual Run for the Pierogies. The run was my brainchild, as chair of the Parma Area Relay for Life. I am glad to hear you enjoyed it – I wasn’t sure how it was going to go never having done it before (!). I had so much fun that I am stepping down as Chair for Relay for Life to work exclusively on the race for 2012. I want to make it even better next year. So, I need your help to ensure that happens!! Please e-mail me your suggestions at councilmanbrennan@msn.com . As I mentioned on Saturday – the response (433 runners and walkers) blew me away! We raised a nice amount of change for the American Cancer Society, thanks in part to your support! Send me those ideas! Want you all back again next year. I will even look into gluten free foods… Thanks again.
Sincerely,
Sean Brennan
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