It all started back in November, sitting in the parking lot of an Olive Garden. My friend and I were talking about how we needed a
hobby outside of being a wife and mother. My friend said she was thinking about running. I thought that the word
hobby and the word running had no place co-existing in the same sentence.
But in December while I was visiting the in-laws for Christmas I decided to take a little run. There were plenty of people to help watch Sadie and I needed the fresh air and exercise. 1 mile turned into 2 and 2 turned into 6. I was in love with the fresh air, the sunshine, the quiet, the space I had to think about what I wanted to think about. And so, that path lead me to yesterday. I completed my very first half marathon - 13.1 miles.
I trained
and prepared for the last 4 months. Friday I got my
playlist ready and went to bed early. Sadie realized that mommy had something special planned for the morning and decided that sleep wasn't necessary and stayed up throwing temper tantrums until 4 in the morning...but that is another post entirely. Luckily, Ryan was very nice and took care of her so I could sleep.
My alarm went off at 5am and I was down to the gateway at 6 to meet up with a friend. All the the participants were to ride
trax to the starting line at the University of Utah. There were so many people on my
trax train that we weighed the train down so much that the doors couldn't close! The conductor made us all move to the right of the train so the doors could close and then the whole way up to the U, every time we
went around a corner, the train tipped precariously to the right. Then to the starting line just in time to hear the gun go off. And I was on my way.
The morning was absolutely beautiful. The weather was perfect and the sun was out. We started out at the Olympic Legacy Bridge at the U of U. My first goal was to get to
Sugarhouse Park. That was about the 5 mile mark. I was feeling really good all the way there. Between
Sugarhouse Park and Liberty Park I started to feel out of energy. I pulled out some
fruit snacks and soon I was feeling much better.
We hit mile 9 as we entered Liberty Park. All along the route their were
handfuls of onlookers, but they picked up in number at Liberty park. It was very fun to have people cheer us on. My favorite was a house that had speakers out on the lawn playing music for us. Very fun! As we went in to mile 10 I was still feeling really good. I was really having a good time.
At about mile 11 I really started to get tired. My hamstrings were burning and I was just ready to be done. In order to keep going I picked a couple of people that were running at my pace and just tried to keep them in my view. I talked to a couple of people. And, I tried to enjoy my music (Thanks to Ryan for helping me pick out some good tunes).
At mile 12 we started up State Street toward South Temple, which was slightly uphill. That hill was terrible!!! I have to admit that I only made it up the hill 1/2 way. I walked the second half. But, it is the only part of the race I walked. I ran the rest of the race.
After the hill I started to feel blisters on both of my feet and I was getting pretty miserable. I just wanted to finish strong so I kept going. As we entered the gateway there were huge crowds of people cheering us on. They really motivated me to
finish strong.
So, I usually run with a
GPS so that I know what pace I am running at. I trained running around an 11 minute mile so I planned on running at that pace in the race. However, I didn't take my
GPS. I just wanted to run at the pace my body was telling me I could. Based on my 11 min/mile training I told Ryan and my parents to expect me at the finish line around 9:30. I ended up running at a 9:30 min/mile and I crossed the finish line at 9:06!!! Unfortunately, because I was so early, Ryan and my family weren't there yet...so no pictures :(. But they arrived there soon after and we met up. It was very fun to celebrate my accomplishment with them. I was very grateful for their support.
After the race I felt completely exhausted. Previously I was thinking of training for a marathon. The very first thing I thought afterwards was that I never, ever want to do a marathon. One day out I am undecided. Give me a few days rest, and then I will let you know. I do think that I want to do another half sometime in the future.
I finished off the day with a hot stone massage (My new absolute favorite thing ever. You MUST try it!!!) and a
carb binge at Red Robin.
In the end I came in at 2 hours, 4 minutes, 35 seconds. I came in number 226 out of 589 contestants in my age group, which is in the top half. I was also in the top half for all contestants, number 1,930 out of 4,355.
Overall, I did much better than I thought that I could. Just signing up and completing the race is more than I ever thought that I could do. I am proud that I accomplished this goal. I couldn't have done it without my families support, from Ryan watching Sadie and letting me leave for hours on Saturday to my dad and mom riding their bikes beside me as I run and keeping me going to my friends cheering me on. Thank you all for your support!
Pics from after the race:
Ryan was super nice and got me flowers.
