Hello. My name is Brooke and I am a half marathon junkie. It's been 5 days since my last half marathon, and I have already signed up for 2 more. Don't judge.
Ok, so here's the race review.... I started last Friday off by schlepping my 8 year old son up to Bethlehem to volunteer at the t-shirt table at the RW half marathon. I tried to play it off as a 'life lesson' for my kid so he learns about giving back to the community and all that crap, but let's face it, there was an ulterior motive....getting mommy into a race for cheap. Volunteering was fun, other than my son being a whiner by 1:00pm, but overall, it was a good time (at least for me).
Sunday was the big day. I woke up at zero-dark-thirty literally shaking. My feeling has always been that I will never be able to run a race for 'fun' because I am an obsessive compulsive weirdo, but it's also because I care. On the day when I am not a complete and total lunatic about a race, it'll mean I stopped caring. And when I stop caring, I won't bother to fork over the fee for the registration.
So, anyway, I got to the race super early, as per usual and wandered aimlessly for about an hour. Seven bathroom trips later, it was time to ditch my bubblegum pink backpack, change shoes, and get ready to roll. I worked through my normal warm up routine, and headed to the start. Not so surprisingly, the start area was pretty chaotic, but I found the 1:35 pacer and cozied up to Steve, who was destined to be my new best friend for the foreseeable future. The race started, and we started cranking out miles through the streets of Bethlehem. Mile 1 clicked by, mile 2 was around 6:40, and then the bitching began. Running with a group of dudes can seem intimidating at first, but let me tell you, they can be a bunch of whiners. The questions started- 'why are we running so fast?' 'don't you realize that we should be at 7:15 pace for a 1:35?'..... Steve's answer was perfect, 'trust me, I am a professional.' Was Steve actually a professional? Most likely not, but whatever. It seemed like a good idea to trust him at the time. Mile 4 started the hills. We hit the 4 mile mark, turned the corner, and it looked like the gates of runner Hell had opened. A gigantic hill was looming up ahead. I think a collective groan came up from our group, but I put my head down, pumped my T-rex arms, and shortened my already miniature stride and made to the top.
What goes up must come down, am I right? Kind of. Bethlehem appears to defy most of the laws of physics, so the next few miles seemed to either be flat or uphill. Around the 8 mile/1 hour mark I started to bite it. My legs felt like a million pounds, my arms and chest were sore, and I started to panic. Not like the 'I am in a cage with a shark and it may eat me' kind of panic, but the kind of panic that eats away at your sole. For the first time that I can remember, I didn't say F-it and allow myself to tank. I started to do a sprint for 2:30, run for 2:30 set of intervals, which actually seemed to make running bearable. Around 11.5 miles, you run back over the bridge into 'town' and then I started to fall apart. At this point, I had been in 11th place (or so I thought) and what seemed to be a teenager passed me. She was running very strong, and I had not seen her anytime during the race, so I assumed that she was in great shape. I let her go without trying to chase her, knowing full well that unless the wheels totally fell off, I would still make my goal of beating the 1:35 group.
12 miles passed, a final hill, around a corner, another corner, then 200 yards to the finish. I was certainly hurting, but as I looked at my watch for the billionth time, I say 1:31....1:31.30....holy moly. I might actually make my goal. I mustered up every last bit of whatever, and crossed the finish line in 1:32.52 and later found out that was good enough for 3rd in my age group.
Now, it's Friday. My legs and chest still hurt, but I got a pretty sweet new pint glass and I can wear my race shirt with pride, knowing that this was a day for not-sucking.
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