Fun Run

I've shared on the blog how I don't like Cat and Jack's ongoing school fundraiser: having the kids, faculty, and staff pay money to "dress down" (wear something other than uniforms) on designated days.  But this weekend, the school had another fund raiser that made a lot more sense to me.  They had a Fun Run, complete with t-shirts for all participants and door prizes for a few lucky families.

The kids have been excited about the fun run and mentioned once or twice that they should train for it.  They didn't seem too worried about it, though, so I didn't make it happen.  Then, the afternoon of the race, they both wanted to train.  I told them I thought it wasn't the best time to start training.  Watching an episode of "Bo on the Go" seemed to them to provide a good opportunity to warm up, at least.  And when we arrived at the park, Jack immediately started doing sprints.

Warming up with Bo.
It's a little surprising that they were able to move at all with all those toys on the floor...

Let's DO this.

Nothing to do with the race - just cute Eliza and Luke hugging.

There were two options for the racers: a one mile course, and a half mile course.  Cat and Jack were both feeling pretty pumped and had no qualms about running the full mile.  Unfortunately, since the only training they had consisted of a 20 minute kids' show, I was afraid they would be in over their heads.  Cat took off in a full sprint and was one of the leaders for a minute or two, but ended up needing to walk here and there.  By the end she was pretty tuckered out, but was still the second or third girl to finish.  (She is naturally fast.  Just think how well she would have done if she was playing soccer this season...)  It didn't help that the course wasn't marked very well and all of the runners, and the observers for that matter, were confused about where the milers needed to go in order to finish.

Cat's the second one in the picture.

"Where is the finish line???"

I couldn't see Jack very well during the race, but he must have run pretty consistently because he was less than a minute behind Cat.  Since he didn't know where to go to finish the race either, he hung out with me for a few minutes, but decided to go ahead and run the last part when he saw that there was more to it.

Jack is running in the red shorts.

Almost done!  For real this time!

Eliza was really sad that I didn't sign her up for the race, but I decided it would be okay for her to just run along with the other half milers anyway.  So she joined the short race, with Ben accompanying her, and she was absolutely thrilled to be a part of the action.  Ben said that he kept telling her that she could slow down but she just wanted to run the whole time.  You go girl!

After the races, the runners received celebratory doughnuts and miniature bottles of water, then door prizes were awarded.  We were one of the lucky winning families and Cat chose an embroidered t-shirt for us.  (The massage gift certificates were all taken at that point.)  Jack and Eliza even got a few minutes on the playground, so it really was great.  I'm proud of my little runners!  Now if only I could motivate them to go running with me some time.  Maybe next time there's a fun run we'll actually train before the day of...?