Several months ago now I was challenged to a half marathon. Ten weeks ago I started training for that challenge. Saturday I finished that challenge at the Top of Utah Half Marathon.It has been years since I have felt as much adrenaline as I felt this past week. It is amazing I had any adrenaline left for Saturday. Friday morning I woke up with race day on my mind. I at one point had planned on working all day, but earlier in the week I realized that I would probably be better off only working half a day. It was a good decision, because traffic was not fun and my nerves would have been very raw had I waited until later to leave Salt Lake. So, all in all leaving early probably saved my family from my nervous rants about Utah drivers.
First thing we did in Logan, after taking a scenic byway, i.e a shortcut that probably wasn't so short, we stopped in at the park in Providence where Saturdays adventure would begin and end. I was extremely impressed with the ease of picking up our packet. I did not have to wait in line for more than 5 minutes. The organization was extremely impressive. It was obvious I was not at the DMV.
Once I had my packet in hand we made a brief stop in at the local Subway to meet up with Amy and Joe before heading over to the Super 8 to check in for the evening. All the butterflies that had been flying around in my stomach all day had made me a little bit drowsy, so it didn't take me too long to get settled in and ready for bed. With the alarm set for 4:15 I was out like a light.
Sleep came quickly and left just about as quickly. I woke up at just past midnight, and then again at 1:57 at that point the best I could do is try and relax with my eyes closed. My mind was so wired I couldn't shut it down, not to mention the fear that I might not hear my alarm, which bytheway was set to only go off on weekdays, so that only confirmed my fears for the next time I set my alarm, ugh....
Anyways Race day was hear and I was up and ready and boarded the shuttle which took us to the park to where I met up with Amy and Joe and boarded the shuttle that would take us 13.1 miles away to drop us off at the starting line. The ride up you could feel the energy of all the runners. Each one had their own story. Several that I talked to this was their first half, others had run marathons. I was amazed at the many assorted body shapes that where there, some of which I was thinking, if I weighed what they weighed there is no way I could have walked that distance yet alone run.
Once we got to Hyrum Park where the starting line was there were people standing around talking and a lot of nervous energy which my body kept interpreting as the need to stretch. I was extremely concerned about my hip flexers, which have been giving me a problem ever since that 12 miler. So I stretched a little here and there as we waited for our opportunity to start the race.
We started toward the back of the line as they had it organized according to your own predicted finish time. We actually started further back than our goal time, my goal happened to be 2 hours 15 minutes. Our strategy proved to probably be such a good move because the first part of the race we ended up running side ways a lot passing people who would finish well behind us. But Amy and I wanted to stick with Joe as long as we could. Joe was having some problems with his Achilles tendon so we knew at some point he was going to fall behind. The real question was whether my hip flexers would give me problems. I hoped that the cool down week might be enough to allow them to heal enough to not give me fits. At the beginning of the race I was not so sure. They still seemed a bit tight. So, I did my best to stretch them while waiting for the starting gun to go off.First shot must have been a call to attention because it seemed no one had moved. about a minute later a second shot went off and the race had begun. The fastest runners lead off then the sea of humanity that was the rest of us followed. The first 3 miles went pretty slow due to the crowd and weaving in and out of traffic. I had been warned before hand not to give it everything up front which I had no intention of doing anyways. It was interesting to see how many walkers we already had past. I was already beginning to regret how much I had drunk before the race and I thought I might have to stop at the portable johns at the 3 mile marker, but as we passed them there was a line and I decided I would sweat it out, which I literally did. I sweated profusely. As we passed the 3 miles we re-hydrated and were off.
Between miles 4 and 6 there were a lot of people slowing down and spreading out. This section also had some of the longer more down hill portions of the race. It was a lot of fun passing people who by looking at them I would have thought they were more fit than myself. It was fun listening in on the conversations, well I should say most of the conversations that were going on. By the end of the 6 miles I was in my rhythm for the most part, but I knew that we were about to go through the toughest portion of the race for myself anyways.
Miles 7-9 was through a winding section of a beautiful country neighborhood. It was pretty flat, but when we had run through this area a couple of weeks ago I struggled. I kept thinking we would be done just around the corner, but every corner had another corner we had to pass. It was miserable. During the race I mentally prepared myself for this section. It was extremely helpful to have people cheering us on as we left the canyon and continued down the winding neighborhood. A couple of families along the way cheered us on and I borrowed their energy giving them high fives along the way. At about mile 8 Amy asked if I was having a hard time keeping a pace. I guess she noticed. It was my mental battle at that point. once I passed the 9 mile mark I was back on pace and felt good.
Miles 10-11 were a mixed bag of slightly down hill to about a mile plus some of uphill. I handled the uphill pretty good, but somewhere after the 11 mile mark I lost Amy. It was somewhere at about the 12 mile mark that reached the top and headed down toward the finish line that my mind started playing games with me. I started thinking, "what the heck am I doing this for." I temporarily slowed to a walk for about 5 paces then started jogging again. I did this a couple of times before I realized I could have done the whole race without walking at all. The final mile I started to pick my pace back up and as I saw the finish line coming I saw DeeAnn, Matthew, Spencer, and Shandi my niece all cheering me on. Spence saw that I was bleeding I had not noticed it but apparently my body glide had not been applied thick enough on one side of my chest and the chaffing had caused me to bleed pretty good. For the final 25-30 yards I sprinted through the finish line it read something of 2:18:41. However, for my personal time which means the time my reader crossed the starting line to the time my reader crossed the finish line was 2:15:59.8. Amy followed me across probably less than 1 minute behind.
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