Seattle Half Marathon Run

Maholla peeps-


Well, I did it. The day I should have been training for arrived, the day of the Seattle Half Marathon. Alex and I awoke at 6:30 am, dressed, ate oatmeal and drank just enough coffee to not have a pounding headache, but not too much to make ourselves puke when running.

The 30 degree darkness stuck around until the start of the race, but it was exciting jumping up and down in the crowd of 10,000+ to stay warm. Alex and I started out together, but he quickly pulled ahead. I hung back and jogged the first mile, thinking the crowd would eventually spread out . . . . it never really did. The whole 13.1 miles I ran in a pack of people, which was fine actually, it really keeps you going.

Around miles 5, I REALLY had to use the bathroom, so I pulled over to a port-a-potty, but the lady in front of me took seriously FOREVER in there- at least 3-4 min. Made me so mad, but that was the only time I stopped, I ran the whole way.

Big thanks to Char and Francie who advised me to carry honey packets with me. I sucked on one of those around mile 6, and another at mile 11. They really gave me a burst of energy. I had one interesting moment during the run. It was around mile 8, and I had just run up hill from the Seattle Tennis Club, over to Madison Ave, and up Madison's hill to the arboretum. At the top of the hill there was this lady, who from the goodness of her heart was passing out orange slices, and I seriously about cried. It was the nicest thing, and it just tasted so good and I had been running for so long . . . . ha ha. Anyway, tears of joy were shed for the orange slice and the nicest lady in the world.

Overall I must say the run was nice, I only had a little trouble on mile 12, which was down hill and my toe started ramming in to my shoes . . . . but I finished strong. My time was 2:03, but I KNOW I would have run it in under 2 hours if that lady had not taken SO LONG in the bathroom . . . . . . uggghhhhh. Well, that and if I had trained properly, ha ha. Anyway, Alex finished at 1:49. SO FAST!!!

I do feel proud that I ran the whole thing, and that it was NOT too bad considering the only training I did was running greenlake every other day, and 2 6 mile runs. I do feel a sense of accomplishment, and I would consider running another one . . . . . just not anytime soon :)

My mom and dad met us at the finish line, which was super nice. It means a lot to have people cheering you on. They took us out for brunch after, which was also really nice. The rest of the weekend was spend lounging around on Alex's futon, watching various Christmas movies and moving as little as possible.

Ciao!