A Little Competitive

In case you’re wondering, I had a lovely time at the half marathon on Saturday. So many fun points:

1. It was just two minute drive from my house. How often does that happen? I could have run to the start, but decided to drive because my mom was coming for the weekend (my daughter’s third birthday!), and I had minutes to finish the race and get myself home and showered before she showed up.
2. The race swag was super cute. We got a race tech shirt that was all girl- blue short-sleeve hooded with the slogan “Run Happy”. There was a cute race tote. The finisher medal was a nice pendant that read “Finish Strong”. Nike Women’s has a competitor for cute race swag- though I guess it’s still hard to compete with a Tiffany’s blue box.
3. I saw multiple friends at the event. Besides my lovely sister-in-law who was running the 10k with her friend, I saw Sam and Melisse (5 months preggers and super cute), and another neighbor Kasey (who was right behind Melisse at 4 months).
4. My neighbor Hollie ran her first race! Yes, first race and it was a half marathon. She did amazing. I paced her for the first 10 miles before she sent me packing. She did great, finishing in 1:44.
5. We saw a doe and two baby deer along the course!
6. The race was half a mile short! Okay, I shouldn’t be too happy about that, but I wasn’t going to PR anyway, so why not finish early.

So, yes, super event. I have to say, it wasn’t super easy to hang back at an 8:20 pace, and not because I’m in super shape and could run a half at a minute faster than that like I use to, but because I saw the leaders were actually rather slow. I think they were only running about an 8 minute pace! You see my competitive side? As much as I ached to move up in the race, I kept running with Hollie. As we approached the turn around, I started counting the runners ahead of us out loud and noting their degree of tiredness. I think Hollie thought I was nuts. As we made the turn and ticked off more miles I told her we were gaining on the ladies in front of us. Reeling them in. I think she was too tired to care and was just trying to hang on.

At mile ten she said I should take off and I did because at that point in a race it becomes all mental and I sensed she needed her space. I probably only picked it up a minute a mile, but it was so fun blowing by the girls in front of me one at a time. This is one reason it’s fun to save something and race from the back. I felt stealth-like sneaking up on them and passing them. I caught three of them. I would have caught two more if the race wasn’t half a mile short- which by the way through me off since my Garmin had been spot- on-accurate the whole race until the mile 9 marker. I thought perhaps the markers were out of place- not that the race was going to be short. I finished 5^th. Not too shabby.

Next up is the See Jane Run half. I know I want to run this one for myself since it will be the beginning of my build for the marathon in the Fall. I’d like to assess where I’m at and use it as a gauge to measure progress. Should be another fun one because I know several friends running it.

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