USAF Half-Marathon

It's been one week since my triathlon, and yesterday I completed my eighth half-marathon in Dayton, Oh. The weather was a bit hot, and by the fourth mile I had shed my shirt and was running in only a sports bra, which only barely helped the conditions. I brought along four Gu's which I downed every half-hour or so - by the third and fourth ones I was nearly ready to vomit, but knew that I had to do whatever it took to finish the race.

You see, I signed up for the Chicago Marathon in February 2009. That gave me 9 months to prepare - both physically and mentally - for the race which was to be my first ever full length marathon. Sure, I had run 6 half-marathons by that point, one of which was completed with no training whatsoever. So I thought that with the minimal amount of training possible (have I ever mentioned that while I LOVE participating in these endurance sporting events, I really despise the training portion), I would be able to pull off the full marathon - piece of cake. Well, needless to say, that fantasy came to a halt during the USAF Half-Marathon when, by mile three, I had already decided that if I had to run 23.2 more miles I would surely die.

I thought that what I lacked in physical preparedness, I would and could make up for with my mental state. I figured with some positive self-talk and a cool and catchy mantra I could make it. And well, if I didn't think that I could make it by mile three, then by mile twelve when that last 1.1 dragged on I knew it wasn't going to happen. By that point, if someone had come up to me and said, "congratulations, now do what you just did one more time" then we would have had a homocidal runner on our hands.

So, I finished this half-marathon with a personal best of 2:27:07, and decided that during the next three weeks while waiting for the Chicago trip, I would just focus on being supportive to my boyfriend who will be running his 13th full marathon that weekend. Besides, I'm a bonafide "triathlete" now - and cannot be bothered with the task of merely RUNNING anymore. Anything not involving a swim and a bike, count me out. :)