Seattle, WA - July 15, 2012
I decided to plan an out of town trip around a half marathon with a group of friends and this time we would train - can you believe it?! I knew I was destined to improve my horrible 3 hour finishing time so I thought this would be a great opportunity. Each week as our training progressed and my mileage was increasing, I felt more accomplished than I'd ever felt and wanted to run farther and farther! Then the summer heat in Arizona promptly took the wind out of my sails and brought me back to reality. We finished training at mid July and embarked on our trip to Seattle to see how we could do.
The weather was drizzly, gray and cold in Seattle this past weekend. I knew it would be better to not be nervous and treat this as just any other weekend long run we had to complete. With the exception of the purple tutus and the massive amount of people, it was just like the other long weekend runs. Right....
Once the race started, me, Tara and Kristina (my training team) set off on a fantastic pace that was sure to keep us energized through the next two and a half hours. We made it through feeling great - the weather wasn't as bad as we thought once we warmed up and it was nice and flat - none of the heat and hills we were used to in Phoenix.
Around the 8th mile, I decided to speed it up a bit and get this race over with because I was frankly tired of running. I finished the last 5 miles on my own (without my headphones because I forgot to bring them along). The last 2-3 miles were the worst- my brain was telling me it was time to stop running but the race course was telling me I was far from finished. I desperately tried to tell my brain to shut up and to get my legs moving faster but it wouldn't work... this is when my training partners typically distracted me with conversation but i had thought it would be a good idea to leave them behind. Bad idea...
At the last mile, there were people cheering us on and music to pump us up. I decided to go as fast as I could for that last mile so I could finish it off. I think at this point it was pure adrenaline because I know I didn't have the energy to get it moving! I finished the race and beat my previous time by 30 minutes! 2:24 to be exact. My two goals were to beat my previous time and to jog the entire thing and I met those goals. Yay me!
I can't wait to get pick a new run and start training (after it cools off a bit I think). I want to get a few 5Ks under my belt to see what kind of time I can pull on those and then work my way back up to another half. Tara and Kristina are going to run another half marathon here in Arizona in November and I just might join them. I haven't decided yet but I know I'll run with them while they train. I think I need to suck it up and pay to join... we'll see!
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