After of 10 weeks of training, on August 25th, I ran my first half marathon! It feels absolutely incredible to be able to say that I finished the 13.1 miles run. It has given me a confidence boost in knowing that I can push myself to do unbelievable things. I AM strong and I CAN do hard things!
We drove up to Logan Friday night and stayed with our friends the Bangeter’s. We first stopped in Providence to pick up my packet and finalized the registration. Being back in Logan brought back so many fun memories of when we used to live there. Before going to our friends, we stopped at a place that we used to frequent while living there, Cold Stone. We got ourselves a yummy cold treat and enjoyed the evening being together and talking about old times. We then headed to our friends house to get ready for bed. We stayed up a bit chatting and catching up with Matt and Jackie. It was sure fun seeing them again. I tried to got be fairly early but I was too nervous and excited. I finally fell asleep and then woke up at 4:00 am to get ready to head to catch my ride to the loading station. My friend, Katie, whom I have been training with was to meet me there so we could board the bus together. I couldn’t find her in the mist of all 2600 participants. I was getting really worried because running 13 miles with out my training buddy would be impossible! We are each others cheerleaders. Finally when I was just about to give up, we found each other! What a huge relief and an answer to my prayer!
We boarded the bus and they drove us up Blacksmith Canyon to the starting line. It was so cold at 6:00 in the morning. We were shivering and just wanted to get running to stay warm. Finally at 7:00 am the gun went off and we started running. The first 7 miles of the run are down hill which helped our time quite a bit. Those miles didn’t seem too grueling and when mile 7 hit we were pretty excited because we felt great! Miles 8-10 were just painful. They were mostly flat and uphill. We were exhausted and at times I just wanted to stop. I kept silently praying for help. I knew that I could do it. I just need that little bit of extra strength to get through the uphill parts. After mile 10, I felt pretty good. The course started to gradually go downhill which helped so much. When I turned the last corner and saw the finish line, I had a huge surge of adrenaline and finished the race in 2 hours and 14 minutes! It felt so good to stop running and be done with it! My legs felt like a ton of bricks and I knew I was going to be sore. Katie finished in 2 hours and 17 minutes and we celebrated our accomplishment! Mark and Sariah were there to cheer me on down the finish line. It was exciting having them there to be my support!
After getting home, I was exhausted. I took a good nap to help me recover. After waking up, I found that my legs were so sore! Nothing else on my body hurt but my quad muscles. I couldn’t stand up, sit down or go up or down stairs without wincing in pain! My muscles were so tight! I thought for sure my knees would be the things that hurt but that was not the case. The down hill and up hill portion of the half really worked out my quads. It took me a good 5 days before I could finally move with out pain. After the pain was all gone, I was able to look back on the whole experience and feel excitement in completing one of my goals! I have realized that the mind is definitely stronger than matter and that we can do so much more than we ever though we could! Such a great experience to have!