Yawwwwnnn...Yesterday morning my sister and I woke up at 3:30 am and drove down to Provo for the Provo City Half Marathon Relay. My husband is the BEST. He watched all 8 kids at home for us while we ran. I am a lucky woman.
Well, we got down to Provo and Joy caught the bus up to the start. She said their were bonfires to keep them warm up there. They did a couple t-shirt giveaways and she got 2 shirts. Lucky her!
I sat in the car at the switch off point and took a nap. Haha! Then I had to go to the bathroom. Talk about scary! It was pitch black outside and I had to go BAD. Do I go find a port-a-potty in the dark or do I attempt to find a real bathroom in the park. Well, if I find a real bathroom, will it be open? I'm talking to my mom in Africa while I'm deciding and I'm saying where I am, what I'm doing, an all that stuff in case some psycho comes and gets me while I'm going to the bathroom. Hahaha! I ended up finding a nice restroom in the park. You'd think I'd learn my lesson about eating a jalapeno burger the night before a race.
Well, after another nap it was close to the time for Joy to get there and for us to switch off. Turns out the half started 15 minutes late, so I was waiting for a while for Joy. Once she arrived we switched off and I started running. I forgot my headphones so this was a music free run. It wasn't bad. I kinda enjoy running without music sometimes.
(Joy handing off the slap bracelet.)
I was running along and it dawned on me that I didn't tell Joy how to work the keys and the car. Awww, crap... it's a push button unlock and key-less start. I just kept thinking that I should call her and tell her how to work the keys. I kept watching all the cars passing by me looking for my car. I was about 3 miles from the finish when I hear "Hey, Cathy!!"I turn around and see my sister with the car keys in her hand. "OH NO!!!" I thought. I knew it, I should have called her. Well, she comes up behind me and tells me that she ran into one of her neighbors and decided to keep running and finish the whole half marathon. Her neighbor was going to drive her back to the switch off so she could get the car. She told me, "I didn't wake up at 3 am just to run 6.5 miles!" I thought it was awesome. I'm so amazed with her. She was on track for a 2 hour half and then she caught up to me after going to the car, stretching, starting, turning around, and then starting again. She's awesome!
We finished in 2.10.26!!
I ran my 6.8 in 1.13.36! I kept it under an 11 min pace! :)
We did it!!! Pretty cool metal too! My second half marathon was the Provo City Half and back then they didn't do metals. I got a crappy little plastic bracelet. So, even though I didn't run the full half marathon, I consider this metal a make up metal for the one I didn't get. Hahaha!
The next full half marathon is June 9th. The Utah Valley Half. I've gotta do better at running every day between now and then though. I want to be able to finish it in a good time without hurting myself.
