13.1

Preface: I just realized I never posted this and it has been sitting in my "drafts" bin. I added a little.


Saturday (April 21) I ran my half marathon, and survived to tell the tale. 13.1 seems like a lot of miles but when you look at all the miles that you put in just to get to those 13... wow. I have the Nike+GPS app that I have had since the end of February (Feb 29 was my first clocked run on it) and since then I have run 64.5 miles in prep for my half marathon. If I could cram it all into one day I could run to Evanston, WY. I would probably die before I made it there because that is too many miles to run in one day, by one person.

Running a half marathon was a decision made on a whim one December afternoon. One of my co-workers asked if I would be interested in running it with her. I thought, "Well I wanted to run a marathon at some point in my life this would give me a feel for what that would be like." I agreed. She showed me where to sign up, did that, paid my money, and printed my training schedule. The schedule I had started 20 weeks away from race day. Week 1 happened to be the very week I agreed to run this race.

I modified the schedule to so that my long runs would fall on Saturdays and I would rest on Sundays. Saturdays kind of sucked once I got into the high mileage runs because I had to wake up early (6 or 6:30) and go meet my friend to run our 8-11 miles then get to work by 10AM. At work I always prayed for a slow day so I could have a task that allowed me to sit down. Granted whenever I did get up I hobbled around like a 100 year old. All this running with pain in my foot and my friend's knee acting up but we survived.

Race day finally came, well to be honest the last few weeks before the race flew by. Here it was 4:30 in the morning and I'm gearing up, waiting for my friend to come pick me up. We arrived at the starting line with still plenty of time to spare but the crowd of runners was massive. We picked out a spot ate our banana with peanut butter, drank water and stretched a little. I was ecstatic but I tried to conserve my energy for the race so to distract myself I did some people watching. Some of the gear people were wearing seemed odd like a pink skirt with streamers and feathers but to each his (or her own).

Finally the announcement rang out that the runners needed to start lining up for the half and full marathon.  We were packed in like cattle. When a trax train needed to make its way up the tracks we were invading the personal space of many strangers. Finally the countdown began 10...9...8......3...2...1! And we were off, well sort of. With everyone packed in so tight it made it difficult to run/jog so we were just walking until we crossed the official start line then we could start picking up our pace. We found a pacer that was holding a sign saying he was going to be running the race at 9:55 per mile. That was a little faster than our miles during training but we decided to stick with him. Based on our training times we figured that we would finish the race in about 2 hours and 15-20 minutes but we were willing to challenge ourselves.

Miles 1 and 2 were kind of rough. For me they are the worst miles because they are my warm up miles and my muscles try to talk me out of running but I keep pressing on and they eventually just give in. At mile 3 our pacer yelled out," 10 more miles! Thats your average morning run come on lets do this people!" Miles 3-6 or 7 went pretty well nothing major to report they were pretty easy breezy. We busted open our shot blocks, which are little cubes that are like gummy bear consistency but they are suppose to help replenish sugar and stuff in your body from running or other forms of exercise. I had never had them or used them during my runs so far so I was a little nervous about it but my stomach handled them just fine. Mile 8 is when my hips started to get a weary and hurt. I just found other things to focus on. Really I think it was all the people that were out holding signs, ringing their cow bells, and old ladies waving from their pores that kept me going.

Miles 9 and 10 went by, my body started to get more and more tired. Half way through mile 11 is the farthest I had run in my training and I still had about 2.5 miles to go. Whoever decided to have a hill for the tail end of the race is horrible. Towards the end of mile 12 this hill starts. I looked up to the top to see the capitol and to realize that someone had relocated Mt Everest. I felt like I wasn't going to make it. Thanks to my friend and the pacer and the people around him that were yelling out encouragements I kept climbing. I focused on the ground in front of me because it didn't look like a hill it was just asphalt and I can conquer asphalt one step at a time. There were a few times I still looked up at the hill and then I thought, "At least I don't have to go all the way to the capitol," because after South Temple the hill gets steeper. Finally reaching the top of the hill and turning onto South Temple the finish line came into view, all the people there cheering and a downhill slope. My legs were felt like they might give out at any step and I was pretty certain there was a toenail that had fallen off and was now floating in my shoe but I carried on to the finish! It was the greatest feeling to cross that line (even though the look on my face that the cameras caught does not show it). Once across the line there was someone there to place a medal around my neck, another person to hand me water and still another to hand me a chocolate milk. I was feeling like the Queen of Awesomeness. I found Trev, my mom and my nephews that came to support me and when I saw them I about cried! I had just accomplished one of the coolest, most difficult things I have ever set out to do. I loved that feeling and I may do it again, even if I don't I am still going to keep on running =)