13.1 Miles

On Sunday, April 11th, after about 4 hours of sleep, I crawled out of bed.  My stomach was jumping and I felt nauseated and nervous.  I choked down a bit of toast and peanut butter (before Lance ate it all) and drank some sparkling water.  Then Lance and I headed down to the square because the big day had finally arrived: the day of my first half-marathon.

Since December, I have been training for this day.  I have logged roughly 300 miles since the start of the year. I may have not always run happily or even as much as I could have, but I ran consistently, and it showed.

I honestly had no idea what to expect, so I simply planned to run it in under 2:15.  I didn't really even look up to see what my mile splits would be.  When I arrived, however, I discovered that Fleet Feet had pacers, and that one of my running buddies was the 2 hour pacer.  He asked, "Do you want to run with me?" and I said "Sure," thinking I would slow down if the pace was too intense.

At first, it was, but I kept J and his balloons in my sight until my legs adjusted to the faster pace, and I caught up.  I held that pace for about 9 miles or so, or until I hit the hills (if you look at the graph, you see that it begins and ends with some mean hills).  Then I hit a really ugly hill, and I had to walk.  (But then again, so did most people).

I rounded the corner on the last mile to be greeted with cheers and offers of a beer, not to mention pirates.  Fleet Feet was manning the first/last water stop, and they were amazing and so encouraging.  From that point on, I had a giant grin on my face. Even though I had woken feeling poorly, even though I got a crappy nights' sleep, even though this was my first half and I had no idea of what to expect, I knew I was going to finish and finish extremely well.

I crossed the line at 2:02:47, way under my initial goal of 2:05 and my revised goal of 2:15.  I was ecstatic.  Lance had cheered me on at the very end, and they announced my name as I crossed the finish line, and someone handed me a neat finishers medal.  I did it!

And now I'm completely hooked.