*Thirty* years of racing

It's 1979. "Rocky II" is showing at the movie theater. Gas is 86 cents a gallon. "Happy Days" is on ABC and "I Will Survive" is on the jukebox. And I ran my first road race.

Yep, it's been thirty years since the 1979 Rock City Road Race 10k, my very first road race. I know that it was held in February, but I didn't write down the exact date, so I'll have to take the whole month as the anniversary. I remember it being pretty chilly and even having some precipitation on race morning, but my father, who was active in the Chattanooga Track Club and the race director for the Rock City Road Race, encouraged me to have fun and not to push myself to the point of getting hurt. I had been "training" through cross-county and track practices, so I knew I could do the distance, but running in a mass of people in a real, official timed race (with t-shirts!) was a new experience for me.

The Chattanooga Track Club's extensive records, which they have online, show that 335 runners finished the 10k (only 43 women) with another 115 finishing the 1.5-mile fun run. The field was heavily skewed towards the younger runners; my time of 49:51 -- which I'd gladly take these days, BTW -- was only good enough for 37th in the "19 and under" division. I do see a lot of other names from my high school's running teams in the finishers, so more than likely most of my team showed up to run along with the best from our rival high schools.

The Rock City Road Race t-shirts were also very prized because of all the color they used, usually in a depiction of a hot-air balloon, which was Rock City's usual advertising element at the time. I ran in this road race the following year as well, improving my time to 46:03, but I don't recall why they were my only two years in it, since Dad was race director at least a few more years.

Hard to believe it's been thirty years since I first pinned on a bib and took out onto the road. I hope that thirty years from now I'm still doing it.