Photos are here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/mqFZLHoGY4QXVbFm7

Before the Start:   My 77^th race of 2025 was the Holiday Hunger 5K held in Bulverde, Texas on December 6 at Bulverde Community Park, with a start time of 9 a.m. This event supported Provisions Outreach, the Bulverde food pantry. Due to some ongoing local road construction, I left fairly early to get to the race site, arriving at 7:30 a.m, so had plenty of time before the start to chat with others there, including my friends from Athlete Guild who laid out the course and did the timing and results for this event, and get a few pre-start photos. This is also a dog-friendly event; there were several dogs in attendance, all very friendly, and even more friendly to me, lol, after I gave them dog treats.  For a fairly smaller event – and being done on the same weekend as the inaugural San Antonio Marathon Half-Marathon, which the majority of the members of the local area running community had signed up for – it was a fairly good turn-out with 112 finishers, walkers and runners.

On the course:  After the playing of The National Anthem, we got started right n time. The course was a simple out-and-back, starting at the park, going down Bulverde Lane, making a right turn on Obst Road, going to our turn-round point and then coming back exactly the way we had gone out. The course was mostly flat, with a few inclines; nothing you could really call a hill until we got closer to the turn-round, where we did go down a fairly long but not-too-steep hill to get to the turn-round, and then we had to climb back up on the way back.  I did my usual run/walk thing which is normally 8-minutes-run/2-minutes-walk; however since my absent-minded-self forgot to bring my garmin watch, I used my music player for my intervals, running for 4 songs – estimating that each song would be about 2+ minutes – and walking for 1 song and this worked pretty well.  After making the turn-round, I then got ambitious, lol, and ran non-stop to the finish.  I felt pretty good for the whole route, ending up with a chip-time finish of 41:55, which was good enough for first in my 70-99 males age group, and I was the 59^th finisher overall of the 112 participants.

After My Finish:  I got a few photos of some others coming in and then wandered here-and-there in the finish area, getting some after-photos of the happy finishers and their supporters; handed out more dog treats; and enjoyed some post-race treats. The awards ceremony was held at the park’s pavilion, where several of the sponsor organizations had various post-race treats and drinks, and hand-out souvenirs (keychains, small towels, and so forth).  The age group awards was nicely done by our MC, Mark Purnell, and he started with we “senior folks” first, which I appreciated cuz, you know, after a run or workout, we senior citizens need to get home after that to take our nap. 😉   

Epilogue:  This is a very nicely done event that I would certainly recommend to others. It’s for a good cause; has a very nice route; the age-group placer medal is really nicely done, and very nice quality race shirt.  Some of the participants and supporters had on some very decorative holiday wear – including our MC – which was fun to see. The venue is very nice too; I don’t come to Bulverde very much and it always surprises me how large this park is, with athletic fields, indoor restrooms, a very nice pavilion, etc. The local traffic seemed to me to be pretty light, and the drivers we encountered were pretty patient about it all. 

Mucho thanks to all who made this one happen for us participants, e.g., all the sponsor; the local law enforcement officers that were out there for our safety; Athlete Guild for doing the course set-up, timing, and results – with a special shout-out to my old friend Coach John Purnell – and I mean that literally, he and I are getting to the point where we are both becoming older than dirt, lol – who was one of our Course Marshals making sure we were going in the correct direction; and thank to all other volunteers there for us, doing packet pickup, race day registration, helping with the awards, and so forth. Also, thanks to all the local residents and drivers, who were very patient with us invading their space for a few hours; and to anyone else involved I may not have mentioned here.  Thank you all! Whatever your personal goals are, hope you always obtain them and stay safe doing it.