The Fiesta Bowl Half Marathon

Well, this past weekend many people on our running team went up to run the Las Vegas Half Marathon. I decided this was just not feasible due to the cost, Christmas right around the corner, the fact that we were just there in October for Ragnar, and because we are heading back to Vegas at the end of this month for our anniversary. Many reasons here, so myself and 2 of my other close running pals on the team, Karine (left) and Amanda (center), decided to sign up for the Fiesta Bowl Half Marathon. I've started to REALLY like getting medals for races, so with this race being such a lower price than Vegas with a non-rock 'n' roll type medal it was worth the $50 to get in a half as part of my training with a different medal. Call it "Something Shiny" syndrome if you will.

We got to the race start area at about 6:45 and the race was a 7:30 start. Not an overly crowded race (only 961 halfers) so we had no issues parking or picking up our packets that morning. I was literally parked right next to the finish line and packet pick up. Rock star parking! We got our bibs, tech shirts and timing "tags" and walked over to my car to prep. It was a cold morning so the first thing I did was busted out the hand warmers for each of us. I worried about what layers to leave on, but ultimately decided that I'd warm up eventually and I opted for just a long sleeve shirt, my capris, and some cheap gloves. We got our bibs on, timing tags (a type I never used before - interesting orange tags that don't have to be returned - very cool), hats, water, etc and headed for the potty pit stop. Unfortunately, we were in line JUST FOR ME and missed the half marathon start. Thank goodness for chip timing and great friends that will wait for ya anyway! We were just hoping we were on the right path because we were surrounded by 5Kers that had just started. Luckily they had staff out there to tell us halfers to turn left!

It was actually quite nice starting later. We didn't have to fight a crowd and we quickly caught up to those that were slower than us. Amanda, Karine and I ran about the first 3 miles together. Amanda pacing us through. After about 3 miles, Karine (our newest mom on the team!) needed a break from our crazy Amanda 9:20 pace. I was still feeling good so I decided to keep going. Amanda cut her pace and stayed with Karine. Maybe I was motivated by the twin tu-tu costumes racing in front of us! ;) I kept going, feeling good! This race was on my daily turf - north on Scottsdale Rd to Via de Ventura, right past my work building and then south on Hayden back over to the old town area. It was flat for the majority. Only two dips down onto the greenbelt and back up a couple times. Just nice Scottsdale scenery the whole way. It was overcast for the first 6 miles or so but the sun came out on a very lovely morning!

While I kept asking myself, "How do you feel?" I found that encouragement from others definitely sticks in my mind. I kept thinking of a Facebook post from my best friend's brother, Danny, who is an amazing runner - wishing me luck and he said "I hope you get a PR!" Danny's comment stuck in my mind as I ran - he's one of the fastest runners I know - hoping I PR. I wanted to be able to say I did. Not even in a competitive nature really, but just because I really wanted it to be true so that a fellow runner's wishes for me would be fulfilled. Do you know what I mean by that?

Anyway, I had a great surprise at about mile 6 right in front of my work. I expected Karine's husband and saw him out there to cheer us on, but then shortly after I saw my friends Justine and James out there cheering for me! What a boost and a wonderful surprise!! I didn't know they would be there. :) They gave me more of what I needed to get through when my knee pain started setting in at about 7 miles in. I only stopped twice - once to pull up my knee braces real quick and once to stretch my IT band at mile 8 so I could get past my left knee pain. I walked through a couple water stations just so I didn't cover myself in cold water in the cold weather, but really I ran all that I could and I had never actually RUN that many miles without a good deal of walk breaks. Coming around the corner to the finish and seeing my friends there cheering me on again was fantastic!!! My time was 2:19:47 which was a 10:40 pace. I PRed by about 7 minutes! The Garmin of course lists the race as slightly longer than 13.1 clocking me at a 10:31 pace, but you never know what to believe. ;) Either way I was VERY happy with my official time! Just minutes later Karine and Amanda came around the corner after keeping up an awesome pace and Karine grabbed her new baby boy from her hubby and ran with him across the finish. The race staff gave little Aydon a medal...awwwww! Such a nice race with great friends running it and cheering us on as well! James even put together a short video of us - check it out if you're interested here.

If you guys are looking for an alternative to PF Chang's or just a nice flat run in general next year for a 1/2 - I highly recommend it!

Excited to see how the next few weeks of practice will go - I really hope that my knees are going to hold up to get me through the full next month! I'm already getting a little emotional about trying to get through a full - is this normal? I'm scared and excited at the same time. I've started to do my therapy exercises for my knees regularly again and my ankle is finally getting better after 2 and 1/2 months. Are any of you doing the PF Chang's full? I don't really know anyone my pace doing it so that is a bit of anxiety for me too. The girls on my team that are doing the 1/2 this time all say that I will likely have a better time being on my own and making it a personal experience within my self and that they will be there to cheer me on after they finish their 1/2. It's such a long time though! I'll be looking for some advice before race day if I do in fact decide to go for the full!

Mountain Trail Adventure

This Picture was taken in front of my Parent's garage, right after our Saturday Adventure.

On Saturday I had the opportunity to run in Ogden with Marcie. My parents recently moved to North Ogden, and I havent figured out all the options yet. I searched mapmyrun.com and found 2 routes that joined up with each other. Together they equalled the 12 miles that Marcie and I were hoping for. My Dad took me out on friday night to help me find the entrance to the first trail. I was hoping that we could leave from my parents house on foot. My Dad was looking for the best entrance to this mountain trail. He suddenly stopped the truck, in the dark, and started walking briskly up the mountain. So I got out and tried to follow him. Straight up the mountain. Stumbling through the dark. 'How far up this mountain is he going to go???' I wondered. We did find the trail after we were both out of breath. He thought he could find an easier way to get on the trail, though. Which he did. We found a neighborhood that led right into the trail, with a kinder entry. Thankyou Dad for helping me! I never wouldve found either of those trail entries on my own!

On Saturday I had alarm issues. Luckily Marcie waited on my porch for 10 minutes or so until Noah heard her knocking and woke me up. The alarm issues were not my fault. But that's another story.

The first few miles were kind of brutal. We started out going up hill, right out of my parents drive way. The first several miles were mostly up hill. The first 6 mile half of the trail was a mountain trail with several spots we had to walk over or around large rocks and such. At times we wondered if we were still in the right place. But we kept going. We were looking for Rainbow Gardens, where we would start the 2nd half of this run. We finally got to a spot where we could see Rainbow Gardens. But it looked very far away, still, on the mountain trail. So we took a short cut. The shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line, right? Learned that in my math classes. So we started running down the mountain toward Rainbow Gardens. Marcie demonstrated her crazy downhill technique.

After Rainbow Gardens it was smooth sailing. A nice paved trail. It overlapped part of the Ogden Marathon route I ran in 2006. Fun to see and remember those familiar sights.

When we hit our 12 miles we called Noah on my cell phone and asked him to come find us. No, we didnt really know where we were. We described what we could see and hear. He did find us. A good man.

I look forward to doing that one again. Next time we'll know we are on the right path, and that will take a little bit of the excitement out of it. Its kind of fun feeling slightly lost with a friend. We kept making jokes about the Blair Witch Project...

But it was a super adventure. A great day. One that Ill remember.