In the Shoes of #3732

Three hundred ninety eight out of eight hundred sixty six. Time: two hours three minutes thirty four seconds. Distance: thirteen point one miles. Yes I ran half of a marathon, and for my first time, 398th place is not too shabby. Kurt and I have been training for this event since about the beginning of December. So we had a month in half or so to train for it, even during the christmas season. We had only run 10 miles in one day up to that point, so needless to say we were a bit nervous. We went to bed early so we could rise early and eat a good healthy breakfast 2 hours before so our food would not come rushing up while we were rushing out. We both had used the bathroom at least twice that morning, probably getting rid of our "carboload" we had the night before at Olive Garden. On your mark, get set......GO! And we were off. There were about 1500 people running this thing, and of course, everybody was running as fast as they could at the beginning. Kurt and I were getting passed left and right. We passed a few people, but those people don't really count. I had my new watch on that Kurt bought me for christmas which tells your time, your pace, as well as the distance. I was trying to keep a good pace so that we could be able to make it through the whole thing. We did the first 5 miles under 9 minutes. When I say that, it means we were doing 8 minute miles and some odd seconds. So that's pretty good, not super fast that by the time we are done with our first mile, we cant go another mile, but no super slow to where it takes us the whole two hours to do just one mile. There were a few up hills, which was not fun. Apparently I was going to slow up them that Kurt had to put his hand on my back and push me up them. By about mile 7, I felt the need that I had some left over food that I had not dropped off that morning. My hip was also starting to hurt. This was not good, we were only more than half way there! We still had 6 more miles to go! I was slowing down a lot, Kurt had noticed this but he kept by my side. I saw an outhouse and bolted for it. That may have taken 5 minutes or less of our time. What a bummer. :( We had to stop again about mile 10, but this was just to walk for a tenth of a mile because my hip was on fire! Good thing there was water and gatorade cups every so often.

The killer-----mile twelve. Sometimes you would think this would be the easiest mile. Not after you've run 12 already and your hip is on fire and your legs are ready to give out any second. This mile probably would have taken us about 13 minutes, but Kurt practically pushed me the whole way, so we made it in less time than that. As soon as I saw the finish line, from somewhere up above, I got this innumberable amount of energy and booked it to the FINISH line. We probably past 6 or 7 people on our way. Haha those losers could've gotten a better place, but they were running to slow. We or maybe I couldn't walk for 2 days. I am all better now and ready to start running again. 

Side note.....Katie, Jackson, and mi madre were able to come down for it and mother treated us to a wonderful dinner at Samurai 21. It was superb!