Photos are here:      https://photos.app.goo.gl/pPsQy7ehTkkQW3ZG7

Before The Start:   My 35^th race of 2026 was the Big Red and Barbacoa 5K held on June 27^th at Comanche Park in San Antonio, with a start time of 8 a.m. The company partnered with my friends of iaap that did the course set-up, timing and results. There was a total of 453 finishers for this event, 172 males and 276 females.  There was also a Kids Run before the start of the main event. It was a warm-and-sticky day for this one with a temp at start time of 76 degrees and humidity at 88 percent; sunshine, and very little wind at all. I arrived at the race venue with just over an hour to go until start time.  I’d picked up my race packet on Thursday so after arriving I wandered here-and-there chattinng with friends, volunteeers, and other participants and getting a some pre-start photos. This is a dog-friendly event so I also handed out some treats to the doggies there.

On The Course: We started about 10 minutes late.  There are primarily two different routes that can be used for races here. One takes you to the left, which is pretty darn hilly, and you end up going down a long hill, then across a bridge and then up a pretty steep hill that takes you under an overpass on your way to the turn-round; and then you have to do go back to the finish in reverse, which makes for a darn long uphill climb, before you finally reach level ground and go to the finish. The other course takes a right turn out of the start chute and then a left turn onto a trail that goes past a parking lot on the right. This trail has much more relatively “flat” parts than the other course does, so I was happy that after the start we turned right and did the course on this trail, as this is my personal preferred course for this park. I did my usual run/walk thing of 8-min-run/2-min-walk and took some photos during my walk breaks.  We crossed over two bridges on this course; the one closest to the start/finish was pretty stable and hardly shook at all.  The second one we did, which was closer to the turn-round was pretty darn shaky, especially when several people are on the bridge at one time; good grief. I’ve never understood why the engineers who help build these parks can’t figure out how to ‘stabilize’ the park bridges; gee, they ARE professional engineers, right? You’d think they’d figure something out, good grief; maybe it has something to do with how much that would probably cost. Anyway….I felt pretty good the whole way – except for the few minutes on that one darn shaky bridge, lol.  There was a downhill – not very steep at all though and not nearly as long or as steep as the one on that OTHER course – on the way to the turn-round and when we got to the turn-round we then, of course, went uphill, but it went pretty quick, and then we pretty much had a fairly flat course all the way back to the finish, with just some vey mild inclines – nothing you could really call a hill –  including one very short one as we went back to the finish.  With about maybe ¼ of a mile to go, I fell into place beside a young lady and we pretty much stayed with each other to the finish; she momentarily stopped to walk a bit and I got slightly ahead of her, but she soon caught up to me and we were neck-and-neck right near the finish line, until she just edged me out, finishing about  3 – 5 seconds ahead of me, good for her, and that was kind of fun; got photo with her after we finished.    My age group was 70-99 male. Since I had seen 3 of my speedy friends there – all in my age group, I knew I was not placing today, lol. I ended up with a chip time of 43:54, averaging 14:08 per mile. Per my Garmin, my mile times were 13:19 for Mile 1: 14:18 for Mile 2: and 13:43 for Mile 3, ending up 7th out of the 9 participants in my age group.

After My Finish: I stood near the finish line – away from the timing devices – and got some photos of others finishing, including some personal friends. After that, I got some water and then went and sat in my vehicle for a while with the a/c on full blast, lol, for about 5-10 minutes as I rehydrated; ahhh, that felt much better.  After that, back to the race area, where I enjoyed a banana and a tasty electrolyte drink, and wandered here-and-there  getting some post-race photos of other finishers, supporters, vendors, etc. I did not get to enjoy any Big Red or Barbacoa, as I don’t drink soda anymore and, because of stomach issue side effects from one of the cancers I had, the “spiciest” thing I am allowed to eat is….plain yellow mustard; nothing spicier than that.

Epilogue:  This is a really nicely done event – in spite of that humidity, lol – with a very nice finisher medal to all finishers and a very nice quality race shirt; there were lots of post-race goodies; they even had palettas (popsicles) of various flavors and those I can have, lol, so I enjoyed a cold one post-race and I also had this very good electrolyte drink – forgot the name of it – which was pretty tasty. Mucho thanks to all who made this one happen for we participants: iaap for the course setup, timing, and results; all the race day volunteers out there for us; our MC – whom I’ve known for a while, but his name went right out of my idiot-old-man-brain; the law enforcement officers there for our safety; all the race sponsors of course; and anyone else involved I may not have mentioned here. Thank you all so much.  Oh, also, as the park, during races, is still open to the general public – other runners, cyclists, etc – thanks to them too for their patience as we participants invaded their space for quite a while.

Whatever your passion is, may you always enjoy it safely and have much success. If you’re a fellow runner/race participant and see me at an event, give me a shout-out; love chatting with my fellow runners, and if you are so inclined, we can get a photo together for my race report I do for each of my events I sign up for. Stay safe, stay happy, and enjoy what you do. Cheers.