Half Marathon

The week before the race, I took three days off and ran a total of 10 miles. I had skipped the last long run the Saturday before. Needless to say, I wasn't positive that I could do it. The babe had woken up almost every night that week too. I had pain in my calf, foot, and shin. I told Mr. I would do it if I could sleep all night and if my leg pains were minimal.

A miracle happened! I woke up feeling rested and I only had minor tightness in my leg. We had to go to the ATM to get cash to sign up. I was a little nervous and a lot excited. I knew I had trained and I should do okay, but I was afraid that my injuries would flair up.

I drank an energy drink before we started and put a Powerbar gel and some Swedish Fish in my pockets.  The first few miles felt easy, but I knew we were going faster than scheduled. I felt good, so we kept going. I alternated water and Gatorade at each support station. At mile 4, I ate three Swedish Fish. It gave me a little burst of energy. I didn't eat enough breakfast, so I needed some sugar early.  I think we were at mile 6 when runners started coming back. Mr. Thought there were only 20-30 people ahead of us. It turned out that there were 50+!

I waited too long to take my gel. I did mile 9 instead of mile 8.  I really didn't nutrition train. I only used a gel on the 12 mile training run. That one, I used at mile 5.5 because  I had only slept 4 hours that night. We slowed miles 8-10. I was hoping the gel would kick in and I could run a 5K pace or close to it, the last 3 miles. I didn't feel a burst until the last 1/2 mile. And when we finished, I didn't really feel tired. Or at least like I could do another mile.

Mr.'s app said we actually went over 13.3 miles. If that distance is factored in, our pace was 8:34. The official race pace was 8:44. I was 4th for my age group and 17th overall for the females. It was a good race for me. But as usual, I think I can go faster.