Turkey Trot

What do runners do on vacation?

They run.

What do racers do on vacation?

They look for a local turkey trot to jump into.

Enter the Camdenton 5K Turkey Trot. Via the inter-webs I found this race and invited the rest of the family to join Bill and me early Thanksgiving Day to burn some pre-feast calories. Only Aunt Denise joined us.

Great day for a run. Slightly sunny, with just a mild breeze.

The course wraps around the high school, practice field, a parking lot, an out and back loop with a gentle climb, up a good sized hill and back around the high school and practice field. It's a good course.

As we lined up, I spotted the winner right away. I told Bill to stay with that guy, he'd be the winner. I was pretty much right. 

I never carry a camera or phone with me during a race but Aunt Denise was walking this 5K (a good way to keep her back loosened up) and snagged a few pictures. She caught a great one of Bill. The one she has of me is a blur, you know, 'cause I was so fast! Actually, she wasn't on the lookout for me.

When Bill finished up, he came and cheered me on the last bit of my race, then we grabbed our stuff and helped Denise finish up.

Post- race festivities included door prizes (we didn't win any) and a pie eating contest. I joked that if not many people volunteered to do it, I should, just for kicks. Why not? Nobody knows me. I could just stand up there and calmly eat pie and let others stuff themselves for the win.

So, as you can see, I went for it. Actually, Denise and I both went for it!

 I stuck myself at the little kid end of the table. The rules were one piece of pie as fast as you could with no hands. Your hands could hold down the plate but that's it. No picking up the plate, etc.

Go, Denise, go! Me, not so much. See the guy on Denise's right? He won. He somehow managed to finish his whole slice in some crazy time like 10 seconds or something. A teenage boy's appetite never ceases to amaze! Me? I'm still mildly licking the whipped cream off my pie with a few smidges of actual pie in for looks. I'm also trying not to ralph this all over, since pumpkin pie is only sort of ok in my book and I just got done running. not my choice of post-race fuel.

Haha! Good times!

A little bit of clean-up and then we waited to hear the race results. First place- a turkey. Second place- a pecan pie. Third place- a pumpkin pie. So more pie for the Ward's. Bill took second and I third in our respective age brackets. Overall, we did really well, too but more importantly for me, I beat my race goal.

 So, if you're ever in the Camdenton, Lake of the Ozarks area over Thanksgiving break, we can recommend this race to you. A lot of nice people share their time on Thanksgiving morning to put on this race. And you get pie!