What a fun start! Their were 15K participants so it was very exciting.

I was concerned about a pulled muscle behind my knee that's been giving me pause the last couple weeks, a strain in the ball of my feet and about my hamstrings and glutes really cramping up toward the end.

I never suffered the first two and my hamstrings and glutes didn't wait until the end to start hurting. I would say that happened around mile 2! Mile 2! They did get a little worse toward the middle of the race then the pain stabilized for several miles, only escalating the last couple miles.

I figured I could run slowly with the pain or quicken my pace and allow the music to help with that. I chose faster...and it was fun starting to pass people.

I had to stop and stretch at least 10 times to help with the soreness, though. I would say that added a good five minutes to my time.

I was very proud that I didn't walk hardly at all. The only times I walked were when I was grabbing a drink from my Fuel Belt and I did walk 2-3 minutes of mile 11 as my legs started hurting more and as I prepared to quicken back up for miles 12 and 13.

They didn't have markers at every mile and I'm so glad of that. It would have been depressing. (Yes, I'm the girl on the treadmill who covers the clock with her towel.) I was just a little more than an hour into it and, given my pace up to that point, figured I'd be coming up on mile 6 soon. The next mile marker read "Mile 5". Mile 5? Are you kidding me? I was excited about being almost halfway there. That sucked.

However, later on I figured I was coming up on mile 8 and the next mile marker read "Mile 9" so it balanced out.

As I finished mile 11 and embarked upon mile 12, that officially became the longest run of my life.

I flipped through my iPod to find some fast songs to help get me through the last bit. I couldn't believe that in a few minutes I was going to have completed a half marathon!

There had been live bands stationed all throughout the race and hundreds of spectators. That was really cool.

When I got to that last say quarter or half mile, there were thousands of people along that finish section. That was super, super cool. I picked up my pace and starting passing people.

The run is usually my best in a tri, so I'm a little disappointed that I was a complete BOPer, but I've slowed down with my pace quite a bit this year for some reason.

Oh, well. I just finished a half marathon and ran the entire thing. I'm going to give myself a break.

As just noted, the more distance I add, the slow my pace gets...significantly slower. My pace has slowed down a lot this season even on shorter distances, though, so I can't quite put my finger on it. Oh, well. Tomorrow is a new day and I'm looking forward to it.

Chugged a bottle of chocolate milk, ate half a banana and stuffed my face with a Krispy Kreme donut. I then went off to the side and stretched...and stretched some more...and stretched some more.


Just being slow all around. I will say that having not run 13 miles before (only having reached 11) I was pleased with how easy (minus the cramping) the extra 2 miles were.


I had a question about packet pickup about a week before race day. I e-mailed the coordinator and the RD actually e-mailed me back...within a couple hours. Very impressive.

What a production! That event was a massive, massive undertaking and these guys were on the ball. I can't wait for next year!