On June 3rd I did something I never thought I would EVER do...I ran a 1/2 marathon! I trained hard and diligently ran 3-4 times each week with a long run each weekend in order to get myself ready and it all payed off! I'll let the pictures tell the story of my adventure!
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| Got my bib number and timing chip for my shoe...ready to check out the Expo! |
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| Running with friends is SOOO much better! Dianna (in the middle) has been my cheerleader and coach and got me through my long runs leading up to the race! It's so great having a friend to train with! Amie (on the left) started running when I did and this was our 3rd race to run together! |
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| Waiting at the start...waiting for our corral to get to the front so we could take off! There were over 40 corrals of runners! |
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| Several of our miles were run on the 163 freeway. Cool place to run but the slight slant of the road really did me in by mile 10! My knees were not happy with me at all thanks to the freeway! |
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| We had to pee around mile 5 and one of the ladies who runs the Sweaty Bands booth saw us and asked to take our pic since we were both sporting our Sweaty Bands! |
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| Best part of racing = the medals! |
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| We DID it! My knees were hurting bad so I stopped by the 1st Aid tent after we finished and requested some ice! |
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| We clean up well! Ready to hit Sea World for the day! |
We finished the race in 2 hours and 41 minutes. If we hadn't taken 5-6 minutes for our potty stop we would've had an even better time! Oh well, that's what happens when you focus so much on hydrating prior to the race! All in all we had a really great time and I am ready to run another! For me, the last 4 miles were the hardest as my knees were hurting pretty bad from the freeway running. I hadn't experienced any soreness on my long runs prior to the 1/2 so it was quite the challenge to keep going! I have found that a run/walk ratio works well for me so we consistently ran 4 and walked 1 throughout...until mile 12 where I had to just keep running the last mile or so because it hurt too bad to walk! We did it and we got our medals to show for it!
I am hooked on "racing" and can't wait for the next one! Jaye and I are doing a 5k together in July and then I have 4-5 smaller runs planned for Sep-Nov and have already signed up to run the Las Vegas 1/2 in December with one of my favorite friends! I can't wait for the next race and the next medal!
