Rise and Shine Half Marathon

Well the day is finally here! I made it to my second half marathon! It is cold, windy, rainy, and slightly miserable...but we are here and ready to do this! I was very excited that all of my hard work was coming to a head. I ran 11 miles last week and I was ready to add that 2.1 to it. Little did I remember that the last one I ran was 13.28 and all of the 5k and 10k runs I have ran were always longer!! Anyway, I began with such excitement that for miles 1, 2, and 3 I was under and right at a 10 minute pace! WHOA killer, slow down! I had a time of 29:45 at mile 3! I was excited, but nervous I would exhaust my energy too soon. I then PR'd miles 4 through 13! Literally, I ran an outside run of each of those mile markers and had a PR time for each one! I was so proud of myself. Check us out before the run!

Back to the run, by mile 5 I began to notice that their mile markers were 0.29 farther than what I was running. I dwelled on this the rest of the race! I wish I would not have done this, but I did. I did my routine of drinking at mile 4 and taking my Nitro at mile 7. I should have brought one more just in case for mile 10/11. I didn't walk for the first time until 8.36 and only walked for 0.09 of a mile. Then I didn't walk again until 10.36 for 0.09. I made it to their mile 11 mark and started to really feel down. I was at 11.29 and it said 11. I thought to my self that I really didn't want to run another 2.4 miles!! I began to run walk until my watch said 12.5 and then I told myself regardless of what the final outcome would be, I had less than a mile to go! My goal was to run 13.1 in less than 2:30:00 and I did! I was at 13 miles at 2:28:41 and was at 13.1 about a minute later! *I am waiting for my Garmin to upload my data so I can see exactly where I was, but until then I only have mile times from the watch! This first picture was from early on (I took my sweater off at mile 6) at about mile 3 or 4. 

The picture below was from about mile 9.

The next picture was when I hit the 2 hour mark at the top of campus and was at 10.81!! My goal originally was 11 miles in 2 hours, then I decided that 10.80 was more reasonable. When I ran my 11 mile run I hit 2 hours at 10.75, so today I beat that marker too!! I was still faster :)

Check out my finish!

13.28 was the final distance...I wish I hadn't been so hard on myself with the mile markers in the wrong places! I completed the 13.28 in 2:31:57. Only 1:57 slower than my goal...but I also ran 0.18 longer than my goal too!!

My final pace was 11:26 on the whole, not too shabby!! I was even surprised that my heart rate was so good at the end! 

 

I am super excited to have completed this race. For me, stopping at 10 or 11 miles in training doesn't cut it! I will have to run a 12 mile run next time and then transition into a 13.3 mile run! That is my goal from now on! If I run less then great! Haha Here's to the next workout! Until then...

April