A few weeks ago (July 4th), I ran my 3rd consecutive Peachtree Road Race (PRR). The PRR is probably my favorite race in Atlanta as it’s the world’s largest 10K!

A few days before the race, I headed down to the expo at the Georgia World Congress Center to pick up my race number.

As I usually do at race expos, I walked around for a bit and checked out the different vendors. It was quite busy and crowded, which is pretty normal for this race. After picking up a couple of new items and chatting with a few people, I headed back home.

On the morning of the race, I headed out a little earlier than normal, as the race was starting 30 minutes earlier this year, at 7:00am. I was a big fan of this change as the later in the morning, the hotter it gets!

I was in Corral F this year, so I had a little extra time since my starting time wasn’t until 7:25. I dropped my car off at the MARTA station in Brookhaven and decided to walk to the starting corrals vs. dealing with the crowds trying to make their way to the Lenox Station. And honestly, the walk to the starting corrals is only about a mile and was good to get my legs moving before running.

This year (as I did last year), I met up with my friend Meredith. When she and I ran together last year, we really enjoyed catching up and it really does help the time go faster. After finding each other, among all the runners, we made our way to our corral and started getting ready for the 6.2 mile journey.

Now Meredith had just given birth to her second child a few months ago, so I told her we would just keep her pace and enjoy the time. Once we got started, we got into a nice groove and made our way along the course. 

The nice thing about the PRR is the first half is basically flat and slightly downhill. That can be a good thing and a bad thing. Fortunately, both of us knew to take it easy…as the second half is hills, hills, hills.

The race seemed to fly by, and before we knew it, we were getting past the final hill and near the area where Rachel and Chris (Meredith’s husband) would be spectating. They are both so awesome to get up that early and meet us along the course!

After stopping to chat with them for a minute, we headed back out for the final stretch. Once we crossed the finish line, we were both quite sweaty! I was able to find my good friend Jerry Carnes for our yearly finisher picture!

We walked into Piedmont Park and grabbed our awesome finisher shirts, water and runner boxes. We met up with Rachel and Chris, grabbed a quick picture and made our way to the car to head back home. Meredith and I were both ready to shower after one very hot and humid PRR.

All in all, it was another great PRR! I enjoy running down Peachtree Street and as always, the crowd support was excellent! Atlanta Track Club does a beautiful job putting on this race year in and year out. And next year is the 50th anniversary…maybe Rachel will run it again with me! Until next time…