The Half Marathon

I finally have a chance to sit down and write about the race! WOW, that was a fun adventure! I've gotta say, running a race is SO DIFFERENT from normal training runs. There's just an energy at a race that you don't get in a normal run. There are so many people around you and everyone is excited--I love it! I didn't really get nervous for this race like I did for the last half marathon I ran, and I think part of the reason is that it wasn't the first time and another part is that we ran longer than 13.1 for our training more than once, which I think turned out to be a really good thing, and I'll tell you why in a bit.

It was very complicated trying to meet up with everyone before the race, but we eventually found each other just a few minutes before the race started. We started off a little slow due to the large number of people trying to start off at the same place at the same time (there were over 2600 people running the half marathon). After our first mile we settled into a comfortable pace and hung out there for a few miles. At 4.5 miles or thereabouts, we started to see the first runners going the opposite direction who only had 4.5 miles left to go! We still had 8.5! There were frequent aid stations, every mile to mile and a half and I grabbed either Gatorade or water at almost all of them, which was awesome. At around 8-9 miles, we started to slow down a bit and I was feeling like I needed to go to the bathroom but I didn't want to stop but I wanted to get the run over with, so at about mile 10.5, instead of slowing down through the aid station , one of my running buddies and I split off from the other two (not necessarily on purpose, but I didn't want to slow down because I felt like I needed to just blast through to the end and stop being uncomfortable!) From that point we unintentionally kept going faster and faster, which was SO HARD but we were SO CLOSE so we kept going and going and I swear the last 2.5 miles lasted just as long as the first 8! But in reality, they didn't, because we were going much faster, and even though it was super hard, it was SO FUN!

My friend and I finished it in 2 hrs 16 minutes 5 seconds, my Garmin measured it at 13.2 miles (which is probably pretty accurate because it's very hard to run a course as short as it's measured, due to taking curves longer and such), my race distance based pace was 10:23 and my Garmin distance based pace was 10:18. I finished 108 out of 226 for my division and 1176 out of 2615 runners. I'm always happy as long as I finish in the first 50%. Next half marathon goal, who knows when: sub 10 minute mile pace overall. I KNOW that is doable!

So, back to why running longer than 13 miles in training was a good thing. Running those last 2.5 miles so fast turned the race around for me, from something that felt kind of like a comfortable jog (albeit long and hard on my legs!), to something very difficult, strenuous and taxing on my body to the point that if I didn't have the knowledge that a longer distance doesn't always feel that way, the thought of running a marathon would be freaking me out right now! In all honesty, right when I finished, and during the last couple miles, I was wondering if I'm crazy to be running a marathon in June! I know the marathon will be even harder, but I also know that the pace I choose to run at and how consistently I pace myself and how I train make a huge difference! I feel like I learned a lot about what I should do when I run my marathon next month. A consistent pace can give the same results as running fast then slow then fast again, so I'm hoping to run pretty consistently for the marathon.

So, the half marathon is over. My friends are done training, and now I just need to drag them along with me whenever I can get away with it. We've already gotten right back into things and we ran 5 miles this morning. It felt great. Now on to the marathon!