Time to get ready for the next one…

I am still giddy from my race this past weekend. I still can’t believe I finished, and finished so strong. The results were posted and my official time was 2:20:25. Far from fast, but now I have a starting point and it can only get better from here, right? Well, that’s what I hope. I have already signed up for my second half marathon. I need something to keep me motivated! This time I signed up for the Edmonton (half) Marathon, which is held August 25th, with my friend Jen! This will be her first half marathon so we are going to arrange for a few Saturday runs to train together. I did all my training on my own last time so we’ll see if training with someone else will benefit me. It will be a much larger race than the one I ran on Sunday so I am so excited to see how they compare!

I haven’t done much activity wise since Sunday. I woke up Monday morning with such. sore. legs. I went to work but left around 2:30 because I couldn’t stand sitting still anymore. I am so over this office work! I had booked myself an appointment to get a massage so I relaxed at home for a while and then drove over to get my massage. Can you believe I have never had a massage before? The therapist I had was shocked. I haven’t had any major aches or pains before, sorry lady! I will be making these massages a priority now though; I loved every minute of it. She didn’t use very hard pressure on me since it was my first time and my legs were obviously pretty tender, but next time I will be asking for more pressure. It was glorious though. My legs are starting to feel back to normal now. I’ve been stretching and trying to avoid stairs as much as possible to prevent further strain. I have to get back to the gym and get some elliptical sessions in or something though. August is going to come up fast and I want to be even more prepared for this next race.

Training is going to be a little sloppy for the rest of June and into the beginning of July. In two weeks I will be flying home to Ontario for eleven days. Once I am there I am taking a trip to New York for four days with one of my best friends. The rest of the time will be spent catching up with my family and friends and I couldn’t be any more excited about it. I haven’t been home since October and that was for a friend’s wedding and only lasted a weekend. I need some quality time with some of my favourite people.

We had some crazy weather this afternoon with tornado warnings in place. We only got thunder/lightning/hail, but it was insane nevertheless. Good night!

I did it!

Wow.

I am so happy I get to write this post.  I have been putting it off all day simply because I can’t seem to put into words how great I feel.  Everyone I talk to on the phone barely gets two minutes of talking time in because I am just a blur of endorphin’s rambling on and on.  This is going to be all over the place because my mind just doesn’t stop.

I ran my first half marathon today.  Six months ago I couldn’t even run over two miles on the treadmill, let alone run 13.1.  I signed up for this race though in hopes of motivating me to get off my butt and finally do something for me.  I seemed a little over ambitious at the beginning, but once I make my mind up there is no way I will let myself down.

Today the six months of training made it all worth it.  I woke up this morning at 5:45 to start getting ready for the 8AM start.  I ate a piece of toast and a banana, plus a few bites of coconut greek yogurt.  My stomach was a ball of nerves so there was no way I could get anything else into me.  I left my place a little late as usual but made it to the start with about 10 minutes to spare.  They gave the half marathoners a choice of two different courses from the starting line which was a little weird, but I chose the second route knowing I’d avoid one monstrous hill near the end).  The race started on time and I knew right from the start that this was going to be a good race.  It started out sunny but a little cool, but about a quarter of the way through it started getting overcast and misting slightly.  It definitely wasn’t hot out but I think it was the optimal temperature.  I wore a t-shirt and capri’s from Old Navy and didn’t overheat or feel too cool once, even when the wind picked up by the river.

The miles just seemed to fly by and my legs didn’t start to bother me until about the tenth mile.  Both my hips were starting to ache and a few times I really had to focus on keeping on foot in front of the other.  You really are running off of adrenaline though.  The atmosphere was incredible.  My biggest complaint about the race is that the miles weren’t marked at all and they only had an occasional arrow showing which way you are supposed to go.  There were a couple times I couldn’t see  anyone in front of me and I wasn’t sure where exactly I was supposed to go.  This is the first year for this race though so of course there are going to be a few things to work out for next year.

My friends Jen and Ryan were there waiting for me at the finish line.  I feel like I ran (jogged) the majority of the race.  I didn’t have to take too many walking breaks even with the amount of hills on the trails.  The energy running through me was incredible.  I even had enough in me to sprint to the end!  I highly recommend anyone who is considering running a half marathon or whatever to just do it.  Sign up for something but give yourself plenty of time to train beforehand but just do it.  If I can friggen run a half marathon, anyone can!

I finished around 2:20.  I don’t know my exact time because the finish line was such a blur but all I know is that I definitely beat my goal of running it in 2:30.  That is an amazing feeling.  I spoke earlier about basically changing my goal from 2:30 to just being able to finish the race because I didn’t think it would be possible to finish before 2:30, but I sure did!  Crushed it!

Even though I can barely walk I managed to drive myself to Dairy Queen a little earlier for a little bit of sugar recovery:

I heard ice cream helps with the healing process?