Me, Cael & Allison. It was cold!!!
In keeping with Half Marathon Eve tradition Dean & I went & got cake balls for dessert Saturday night.
We had dinner at Portobello's so I could get some carbs & it was delish!
Sunday morning on the way to the race which is approx. 10 mins. from my house I thought I was going to have an anxiety attack. I don't know why but I felt like I was going to throw up & burst into tears at the same time. I didn't have that feeling before the first one. I sucked it up & found Scott & Lydia.
Not the greatest picture but the sun wasn't up yet. This is the starting line.
This race had a slightly different route than my other half & I liked it a lot with the exception of the overpass. Same overpass as the first half but this half we went across it twice. UGH! It was at mile 2ish & mile 11.5. The second time was really rough & the majority of people were walking but I KNEW if I walked I wouldn't be able to start running so I powered through. UGH!
I felt really good throughout the race. It was so fun because it's a big race & there are tons of spectators. There were people with DJ equipment, guitars & there was even a gong! The route is through a lot of residential areas near LSU which have beautiful multi-million dollar homes so I enjoyed that. A couple of places had bars set up & were offering runners shots & drinks. The thought of that made me nauseous..... When I got around mile 9 I looked at my watch & was in the low 10 min. mi. pace. I knew I would be close to my previous time. Once I hit mile 10 the distance between miles slowed down. Earlier in the race it seemed like the miles were flying by. I knew that stupid overpass was coming & I thought that it was really close to the end of the race. Not so much. It was at mile 11.5. Well, I just thought mile 10-11 was long. 12-13.1 was the longest mile ever!!!!! I saw my friend that I work with about 100 yards from the finish so that was good. At that point I knew I was really close on the time. As you rounded the corner to the finish they were playing the LSU fight song. I saw the time on the clock & it was past my time. I thought I'd started my watch pretty close to when my chip time started so I was a little bummed. Then I saw Allison, Dean & Scott cheering for me & that made me happy. I got water & my medal & went to meet up with them. That's when Allison showed me the text message. Her & Dean were tracking me & got text updates. Final time: 2:19:24. I was so so excited. We waited for Lydia & during that time the guy that won the full marathon finished - 2:38. That's so unbelievable to me!
Normally, my watch is off like 1/10 of a mile compared to my phone & it's always behind my phone. I did not expect to see 13.24.
There was a nice Finish Festival with food, drinks & live music. We stuck around for awhile & then I was getting cold so we headed home. After some stretching & foam rolling I was going to take a nice long, hot bath. I discovered this.
Toodles!
You really rock, Traci! This is so great. I can't imagine running that long...I simply don't know how runners do it. I think you are great! This reads like a story! :)
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Jane
This is so awesome!!! I loved reading this recap. Congrats! Bloody toes and all!
ReplyDeleteYay! I'm proud of you! I don't run, it gives me headaches, always has. I do think about fast walking a 5k in the future, which sounds like nothing but would be a big deal for me. It sounds like you did great!!
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