Tri Zones Training

Unfortunately I have a conflict and cannot do this 5k, but I was approached by a volunteer at another race who assured me it was dog friendly.

 My advice is always go timed (unless you really really don't care about your time at all, like you are walking it with a friend, or your dog isa three leged chihuahua who going to slow you down a lot, or something). 

When you use a timing chip/device, when you finish the race you will know your exact time and pace (most races have someone with a printer printing the finishing times as the race ends); you will be able to compare yourself to other people your age and gender; you can talk smack to your friends who did the same race, err, I mean you can compare your race time to your buddy's; and you will have a record of to compare to other races you do in the future to see if you ran faster or slower (you can also compare your 5k pace to a 10k pace).  Then you can send the URL of your finish time to all your friends and relatives, because it is online. 

You can also use it to gauge if you try something new (new running style/new nutrition/new sneakers) to see if it changed anything.

Also, you think you won't forget your time, but when you become an Olympic grade athlete you will not be able to keep track of your times for all your races (if you have ever done a timed race, go to www.athlinks.com and type in your own name- it will pull up all your races and times- pretty cool, huh?  but it only tracks your timed races).

Red

"Yeah, I swim/bike/run like a girl."