Been There. Done That.

We did it. We ran our half marathon today. It's strange to think it's over now after all the anticipation. How did it go? Let me tell you.

As I waited at the starting line, I wished I hadn't slept like garbage all night last night (and the night before for that matter). Naturally, being the cocky first-time runner that I was, I waited directly behind the line, as Hallie and Liza and Liza's sister Heather went farther back. Despite peeing before going to the start line, by mile two I had to go again, so unfortunately I had to stop at mile three and wait for an open port-a-pottie. That added about two minutes to my time, but whatever.

All-in-all I did as well as I had imagined I would do, until about mile nine when I started to feel like dump. I couldn't figure it out. Last week I ran 12 miles in my training and it barely phased me and I was running up hills too. This run had slight inclines at best, so I was puzzled. Then I remembered my awesome sleep for the past two nights and it all made sense. I wish I could say that I never walked, but that would be a lie. I hated having to walk, especially since I haven't walked during my training runs at all for the past month or more.

Coming down the homestretch, I saw the ginormous blowup finish line arch and started running hard. My dream was to brilliantly cross the finish line whilst listening to "We Are The Champions." Well, I slightly misjudged how long it would take me to reach the mirage of a finish line and I had to hit repeat a couple of times. By the third time through the song I finally crossed the line with a time of 2 hours and 6 minutes, averaging just over 9 1/2 minutes a mile for the race and finishing 76th for my bracket.

I feel content. Sort of. I only wished I had slept better and had a energized body instead of feeling so dilapidated. I guess that's real life factors though.

Annoying things about the race:

*I don't know much about runner etiquette, but I sure was pissed off when around mile nine or 10, people who had finished the race started running back up the course like they were God's gift to running. I felt like it degraded what I was trying to accomplish to watch them breeze by me as I was tired and getting excited to finish. I mean, come on!
*No sweet free stuff. Just bananas and oranges. Lame.
*A nice legit runners shirt made out of fancy fabric (which I own none of) with all the race stuff on it that made my nipples begin to perspire blood. Thanks for the fancy runners shirt TOU 1/2 peeps, but my crappy 10-year-old cotton shirts don't rub my man nipples to shreds.


I guess it's my turn now, I'll keep it short. I was lucky to be able to run with one of my best friends and her older sister the whole run. I wasn't really planning on running with them the whole time but by mile six we were just having so much fun I decided to stay with them. I was slightly nervous for the run seeing as on Thursday my right foot was hurting and I had only run as far as ten miles prior to the race. I think running with them really helped me a good pace and not wear my self out. Anyways I"m just so proud of Jeremy and so glad we did this!