Sunday, January 23, 2011

New Years Eve Day - My first "unofficial" half marathon

So anyone out there who is reading this, YES I am still alive. There were many times I thought about writing, and yet rather than put my thoughts down I decided that they were not important enough to be a blog post. Seriously, I have seen people write about alot less... so again this is my promise that I need to blog about this journey, not just live it in my head. So without further ado .....

New Years Eve Day Run

Since Darann my training partner was going to be out of town again until the end of the week. I was planning on going it alone. Now last week it was just 5 miles, so it wasnt a big deal. This week 12 miles were scheduled. I won't lie, I was darn freaked out about this. What a huge jump from the 10 miler a few weeks ago. And that run seemed like months ago, instead of the real time 2 weeks it had been.

Im a lucky girl, I have alot of good, supportive running friends (even if none of them run as slowly as I do). I called on my friend Lisa, to see if she wanted to join me. Now Lisa I met by accident, through another friend, and she was part of the good energy that lead to my 5K PR. I was hoping she would be able to join me. Thankfully, she seemed up for the challenge.

So the day arrived, and we took off. The weather was super, super foggy but the temperature was about 35 degrees (warm enough for one half zip and one pair of pants). The first two miles were a struggle for me as always, but at mile 3 I felt pretty strong. Lisa and I chatted as we ran along, the miles just folding into each other. At about 4 miles I happened to mention the dream I had the night before. You see, I had this crazy dream the night before that we ran a whole 13.1 miles instead of the 12 miles. So yep, I shared the dream with her ... not with any intentions, but just thought it was a cute dream. At mile 5, Lisa turns to me and says "you know, if we just go 6.5 out and turn around we will do a full half" -- what a crazy girl this was, but of course I was up for the challenge.

About mile 8 I noticed some funny rubbing on the outside of my left foot and could literally feel the blister forming, but I was not going to give up. At mile 11.5 I hit a small wall, and then just pushed through it. From mile 12.5 -13.1 I ran it out, and even included a sprint at the end. Lisa finished as well (and even forgave me for getting her lost). A small tear shed out of the corner of my eye... I was so proud to say we had done it, even though it wasnt official. But who cared... it was a great experience with a great friend!

After that run I felt like I could conquer anything... unfortunately those feelings only last for so long!

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