Sunday, October 18th...RACE DAY!

The alarm went off at 5:00am this morning to allow us time for the preparation required by elite athletes such as ourselves (provision of toast with peanut butter and many trips to the washroom as the nerves were in full effect!)

We left for the Olympic Park around 6:00am to arrive by 630am and checked our bags and then it was race time!! They organized the race a bit different from other races we have run in and sent waves of runners off based on gender and age. Seemed kind of a strange way to do things, as grouping runners by "expected run times" might have made more sense. So, Don was off in the lead group (obviously having nothing to do with the speed of the runners) and Adelle and Jacelyn were together two groups behind (4 minutes after Don left). It would have been nice if we could have all started together, but 'thems the rules'.

The weather was pretty good for the race, about 15C with little wind and overcast. So, running conditions were very good for a race this length. The course had a few climbs in it, but nothing these prairie folk couldn't handle.

There were definitely some elite athletes competing in this event. Some of the age group winners times were absolutely unbelievable. Certainly faster then any other race the 3 of us have taken part in. The overall winning time for men was 1 hr 8 minutes(how is that even possible...21K in 1 hr 8 minutes??? and we think he was in the 50-55 age group!) and the winning time for women was 1 hr 24 minutes (she was in the 35-39 age group). AND....it definitely didn't matter how old you were, as some of the winning times for the 60 and 70+ aged runners were just as competative as the winning times for the 30+!!! I guess that should be inspirational...but it was almost more humiliating...I mean humbling.

The good news was that all of us achieved our personal goals for this race: Jacelyn, our Speed Bunny, set a new PB of 1 hour 50 minutes; Don at 1 hr 55 ; and Adelle at 1 hr 58 (both our goals to be under the 2hr mark). So all was good in our world today! We were cheered on by Cathy and Gizmo (their dog) waving Canadian flags (and Nick taking the photo) as we entered the stadium at the 20K mark. You are feeling pretty crappy by that stage of the race, so it was great to see familiar faces and hear our names and chants of "Go Canada"...even with an Aussie accent!!

Tonight we attend the Closing Ceremonies in a park downtown in Darling Harbour. Then it's off to the north (and hot temps) as we head towards Port Douglas.

All in all, our World Masters Games experience was a very rewarding, memorable and satisfying experience. Already talking about Italy (Torino) in 2013!

**NOTE: Take note of our BEFORE photo - where we look refreshed...and our AFTER photo on the podium - not so refreshed!