Starting from scratch

Whoa, boy. This past two months have been pure insanity. My husband and I are now officially homeowners! We found our house on September 1, after only about 4 days of serious looking. We put an offer in that night, and it was accepted! Fast forward a month, past loads of paperwork, phone calls, inspections, appraisals, and more paperwork, and the house is ours! We have been spending every single night at the house, pulling down wallpaper, yanking out appliances, and oh yes, refinishing our hardwood floors that run throughout the whole main floor. Needless to say, I haven’t run once since sometime in August.

And yet…the marathon is calling my name again. I’ve been reading another runner’s blog for the past several months, and she also had a disappointing first marathon experience at the San Diego marathon. She just ran her second marathon in Long Beach last week, and finished with a time of 3:55! It was over 35 minutes faster than her San Diego marathon. And her description of the way she felt when she finished LB vs SD made me realize that I, too, missed out on that feeling I was hoping to feel as I crossed the finish line. I never had that “Holy shit, I just ran a marathon” feeling. Instead I felt bummed out, disappointed, and burned out.

I want that feeling of total elation. I want to at least come in under 5 hours. Not hitting that time goal was a huge disappointment to me. I secretly thought it would be really easy to make. I just want some redemption. I’ve decided I want to run the Ogden marathon in May, but I am literally going to be starting all over again. I have 7 months to train, and I know I am capable of it – I’ve done it once before, right? But I need to at least get my base mileage back up to 15 miles a week (when it currently stands at zero) before January, when I would actually start my marathon training. Once our move is complete, it will be a lot easier for me to run. I just have too much going on in my life right now to find the time (and especially energy) to get it done. I hope that just makes me want it that much more once I finally can start.

Well…

I’m back. It’s been awhile. I didn’t run through the whole month of June, due to some bodily injuries sustained during the marathon involving sports bras and chafing. I spent some time healing my wounds (and also moving out of and into our new place), so my first run post-marathon was June 28. Three miles.

Three miles. I just ran 26.2 less than one month before. Did you know that is you just completely stop running for one month, you are basically starting back at square one? And add to that an increase in elevation from sea level to almost 5,000 feet. I couldn’t even make it past 2 miles before I had to walk. I tried again a couple days later, and got the same result. So for the month of June, I ran 6 miles total. July wasn’t much better – 19 miles total. All of them were 3 mile runs but one, which was a whopping 4 miler. I still have yet to run 3 miles straight through.

I don’t know what happened to me. I can’t make it past 2 miles without feeling like I am going to die. This past Sunday, I went out to do a 5-miler as my long, slow run. I was going at an 11 min/mile pace and I STILL had to stop to walk. Between the heat of summer, the increase in altitude, and the gigantic break I took after the marathon, my running has dropped WAY off.

I am trying to focus on rebuilding, and even planned to follow a half-marathon training plan just so I could get my mileage back up. I am not planning any middle or long-distance races anytime soon, but I would like to maybe do a 10K this fall. If I am ever able to get my stamina back, I have decided I want to do either the Salt Lake Marathon in April, or the Ogden Marathon in May. I know that during the marathon I was constantly thinking “Why did I want to do this???” but now I feel like I have a better idea of what it will be like. And looking at my mile splits now, I see that I buried myself in the first 10 miles.

Isn’t that what everyone says though? “Next time I won’t do ________ and I will do _______.” And do we ever really listen?

As much as it has been frustrating to feel like I’m starting from scratch, I am still determined to get back in the saddle. I LOVED going out for a 10-miler on Saturday mornings. Long runs were my favorite. I want to get back to the place where I can get out for an hour or two and not feel like I’m about to die.

But first I need to do 3 without that feeling. First things first.

San Diego Rock ‘n Roll Marathon Race Report

I am still without my computer, we’ve been here for over a week and a half now but still haven’t managed to get everything set up. Luckily I have the ability to blog from my phone, so instead of waiting even longer I decided to go ahead and try to describe the things I do still remember, since it’s now been 2 weeks since my marathon.

The morning of the race, I woke up around 5:00, after easily falling asleep the night before. I was worried I would be up all night, but fortunately that wasn’t the case, and I slept like the dead. My husband dropped me off as near to the start as he could, which was wonderful as it was drizzling/misting and the route from our hotel was all uphill. I got to my corral, #12, with just enough time for a potty break in between, and then it was time to start! The beginning of the race was insane, with thousands of runners both in front of as well as behind me. I saw a couple of girls wearing 4:30 pace signs, and figured I would try to stick near them.

Mile 1 was a little behind the pace I had planned to run, 10:42. I knew I had another 25 miles to go but I picked up the pace for the next few miles – bad idea, obviously. Miles 2 – 5 were 10:07, 10:05, 9:54, and 9:58. Finally Mile 6 I hit my goal pace, 10:14, but at this point my legs were feeling heavy and I knew it was going to be a long day.

Every mile during the first few miles, we would pass a band of some sort. It really amped up my energy levels each time I’d run past them; I especially liked the taiko drummers around mile 6.

Miles 7 & 8 were at 10:21 and 10:23, but I was starting to get frustrated because my garmin was about two-tenths of a mile ahead of the race markers by now. It was beeping my mile splits but I hadn’t yet reached the giant flags marking off another mile. In my mind I had already reached a point that my feet hadn’t yet traveled. This was also the part of the race I’d been dreading. Highway 163, the cambered road, and all uphill for the next couple of miles.

Mile 9 was ok, slowing a bit to 10:36 but I knew it was time to pull back a bit. Mile 10 was a slow one, 11:17 but I had started to walk a bit up this long FREEWAY OFFRAMP. We were running up an offramp that looked like it was cut on a diagonal. It was so awkward and uncomfortable, but at least I’d read other reviews of the course that said the best part to run on was the left shoulders, so I tried to stick to that side. This part felt like it went on forever, but finally we reached the downhill portion, although it wasn’t much relief. The humidity was quite high, and despite having a Gu at mile 7 I was feeling really tired already. I managed 10:24 for mile 11, then 11:08 mile 12 and 10:57 for mile 13. I hit the half-marathon mark at 2:17, and I knew that a 4:30ish time was still in reach, but probably unlikely, especially considering I was already feeling tired and had so much further to go.

I continued to hold it together for the next few miles:10:48, 10:56, the slowing to 11:12, 11:16. I got to mile 18 and I hit the Wall. You know, the one everyone says you don’t hit until mile 20? Yeah, it came early for me. I was in the neighborhoods of Pacific Beach and the crowd support was great! They had oranges, water, and otter pops! I took an otter pop from a little girl and nothing in the world sounded better at that moment. I came upon another girl with them another mile down the road, and took a second. But unfortunately, those otter pops were the beginning of the end for me. I started to feel super sick to my stomach, nauseous, and I suspect it was the sugary sweetness of those pops. My time for mile 18 was 12:09.

The last 8 miles were a death march for me. I hit the 20 mile marker at 3:37, so if I could stay strong I could still come in around 4:45 with only 10k to go. But instead I had to resort to lots of walking, and stopping to put my head down below my knees because I was starting to feel a little lightheaded. So the final 10k was a killer. Of course, it’s a freaking marathon right? That’s all I’ve heard is how bad the last 6 miles are. There were people holding signs that said “run these last miles with your heart,” and I did my best, alternating jogging and walking.

My last 6 miles I was sure my legs wouldn’t survive. They were so achy and tired. Miles 21 – 26: 13:46,14:11, 16:27 (that one I sincerely thought I was going to have to stop and not finish, I was dying), 15:47, 16:05, 15:06.

I kept getting told, “You’re almost there, just a little further!” I thought I was almost to the finish, I could hear the announcer saying “if you can hear me, then the finish line will be in sight!” He was a dirty liar because I first had to hit mile marker 26. I couldn’t believe how long two tenths of a mile can feel. I finally, finally saw the finish, and my husband was off to the right on the sidelines. I heard him tell “go Julie go!” and I gave him the biggest smile I could and sprinted (well, it felt like I was sprinting, although it was only a 9:49 pace) to the finish.

The clock timed me at 5:14:05. A full 45 minutes slower than I had wanted, and still missing my second goal of 5 hours. I felt so wrecked after my finish, so I did what you are absolutely not supposed to do – I sat down. Luckily Nick called my cell phone trying to find me so I had to get up and walk out of the post-race shenanigans. Then we had to walk abou 3/4 of a mile to my car. It felt like total hell at the time, but I’m so glad I did because I was actually less sore the next day than I was after my half I ran earlier this year.

I told my husband immediately after the race that I’m never doing another marathon. But how quickly we forget the pain, the struggles, and think that next time, we will be smarter, train more, push less at the beginning. I feel like I didn’t meet my own expectations, which were probably too high anyway, but I feel like I have a score to settle. So we’ll see. I definitely have to make sure I can find a good life/training balance. Let’s just say never say never.

A couple of shots Nick captured - he had been watching for me for 45 minutes since I told him I'd probably cross the finish around 4:30. He's the best!

OMG WTF LOL

That just about sums up the way I’m feeling today. It has finally hit me that I am running a marathon in 4 days. Here are my goals for Sunday, in order of importance:

A. Don’t die.

B. Finish without injuries.

C. Finish in under 5 hours.

D. Finish in 4:30.

I received my confirmation packet with my bib number, #12594. I am in Corral 12. These things mean nothing to my reduced-to-mush brain. I’m not really going into this with any “race plan”; I’ve read about the course and know that there will be times of suckage (i.e. hills) from miles 8 – 10 and then again towards the end. I’m just going to get out there and try to put one foot in front of the other for 26.2 miles and hope for the best.

I ran four miles this morning, and I have one final run to do tomorrow (2 miles) and then no running until Sunday. And after the race, we will be coming back to Oxnard and packing up the rest of the apartment for the next couple of days, and driving 800+ miles to Clearfield, Utah to our new home. I have this feeling that when (if) I cross the finish line, I’m going to be a hot mess of emotion. I was doing my final 8 miler this past Saturday along the Ventura bike path and beach, and I felt myself choking up. I am so sad to be saying goodbye to California. It feels like home. So on the day of the marathon, all of the training and hard work I’ve put in coupled with the fact that we’re leaving just might break me down. At any rate, there will be tears. Marathons seem to be pretty emotional events for a lot of people, though, so hopefully I’ll be in good company

Let the mind games begin

I am officially in my taper now, after finishing my second 20-miler this past Saturday. My run itself went as well as could be expected (making two 10-mile loops is a little tiresome, it’s mentally challenging to have to repeat such a long route twice), but I woke up Sunday morning and my left knee on the outside was just as sore as could be. It was a really weird pain, it would only hurt if my leg was out straight and I tried to lift it while sitting. I was worried that going to teach skating on Sunday would just exacerbate it, but it actually seemed to help. I also managed to hurt my right ankle on Friday night. The people that live in the apartment below had their music just BLASTING and it was making our entire apartment thump…and it was 3 am. So what did I do? I stomped as hard as I could (basically I was jumping up and down in our living room) and lo and behold, they turned it down. But when I woke up Saturday morning, my ankle was sore. Yet it felt totally fine during my run, and Sunday it seemed fine. But I was about halfway through the work day yesterday when it started to ache, and I couldn’t figure out why?

I woke up this morning all nervous about my stupid 6-mile run at the gym. What if my foot hurt during my run? What if my knee flared up again, since the pain suddenly disappeared Sunday night. So at 4 am, I was lying in my bed thinking about my random aches and pains. And of course, as I’m thinking about it, my foot starts to hurt. While I’m lying in bed. Seriously?? I just ended up getting out of bed at 5 and going to the gym super early, and although my ankle was hurting for the first little bit of my run, it felt much better once my muscles were warmed up. And now I’m sitting here at work thinking my knee is starting to feel funny again.

Apparently this is why they call it taper madness. You are finished with the “hard” part of your marathon training (but really, isn’t it all hard?) Your only task in the next couple of weeks is to maintain your fitness, while cutting your mileage first to 75% of your maximum mileage week, then to only 50%. But as the training decreases, the mind games increase. You start over-analyzing every single niggle, ache, or pain. It’s almost enough to make me just want to stop running completely at this point, until race day. It’s already driving me crazy and I’m still 2 1/2 weeks out.

I got my race packet in the mail yesterday too, with my bib number & corral number. It’s all starting to feel real at this point. I still can’t believe I’m running a freaking marathon.

“I’m surprised it took this long to happen.”

I am a klutz. Plain and simple. I will trip over my own two feet while walking down the hallway. I fall up stairs. I regularly find bruises where I bash my knee or elbow on my desk. But for some reason, I managed to always stay upright while I was running. In fact, I was reading this thread on the Runners World forums not too long ago and was thinking to myself, hmm, I’ve never really had a bad wipeout while running.

Until yesterday. I was just doing a really nice, easy 3 mile run, the shortest one my training plan has called for in many weeks. It was a beautiful Sunday morning, not too warm, not too cool. I was only about a mile into my run when I had to maneuver onto the sidewalk to avoid this big SUV barreling down the street. I came to a section of the road where there was a roundabout, and was paying more attention to the car than I was to the road in front of me. I stepped up onto the sidewalk and noticed that the house on the corner had all of the grass torn out of the front yard. Right at that moment I felt my left foot clip something, a sprinkler head on the corner. I was flying forward through the air and came down with a giant THUD on my left knee and then basically caught the rest of my body with my hands. A great big bellyflop. Right when I landed I let out a big “FUUUUCK” and sort of rolled over to my right side. I checked to make sure no one was around to laugh at me, and then proceeded to make sure my iPhone and Garmin were both okay.

I got up and my knee was really hurting. I didn’t do any major damage to it, but between the road burn and the bruising already starting to develop, it was throbbing.

But I was PISSED. I was just about to hit 36 miles for the week, on my second to last week of training before my taper. I wanted to get those damn 3 miles in. I got back up and started to run. I stopped for a second to make sure I wasn’t bleeding down my leg, and since I wasn’t, I finished the last 2 miles before going inside and taking pictures of my battle wounds.

Priorities, people.

If you look closely, you can see another scar just below the wound from another time I fell on that knee. But that was while I was walking. Apparently I like to fall on my left side first.

I took a nice chunk out of my left hand. The other one looks about the same.

When I called my husband (who teases me relentlessly about being so klutzy) to tell him about my incident, he first made sure I was OK. Then I told him the first thing I did when I got home was take pictures for my blog. He said he wasn’t surprised. (I am so glad that I married someone who understands and even loves my craziness.) I told him I tripped over a sprinkler head and basically bellyflopped onto the sidewalk. He said, “I’m not surprised. Actually, I’m surprised it took this long for this to happen. What were you doing that you weren’t paying attention to the sidewalk?” I told him, “I was watching for cars.”

See, at least I didn’t get hit by a car.

Tick, tock

The clock is winding down on my marathon training plan. Which is a good thing, because I am so ready for race day to just BE here. I honestly don’t know if I will ever do another marathon again after this one, simply because it is such a huge time commitment, and I’m running pretty minimal miles right now. This week I am going to hit 36 miles for the week, and next week is the climactic Week 15, where I will run 40 miles total, with my second 20-miler.  Most non-first timers train upwards of 55 to 70 miles per week. I just don’t know how I would ever have the time. But, we shall see.

I am contemplating another half towards the end of summer, but I guess we’ll have to see what happens with my running schedule once I’m back in Utah. I know there is a great new running path that runs right behind our apartment complex, but I’m not sure how long the route is. There’s also a small gym that’s attached to our apartment rental office, so we can use that for free. I know they have a couple of treadmills, so that will be nice to have FREE access to as well. And then there’s the matter of me finding a job…that will dictate when and where I can run as well.

I’m just excited to be in the final stretch. I hope my second 20 miler next week goes well; it’s been a couple of weeks now since my last one and I just hope I don’t crash and burn on attempt #2.

Lucky number 7

Today is a special day for me. I wanted to commemorate this occasion by doing something meaningful with my run today, so I ran seven miles this morning, even though my schedule only called for six. Today marks my 7th sobriety “birthday”. This post is not really related to running, although my running has definitely has a place in my continuing recovery.

My wake up call came on the morning of April 28, 2002. My drinking had been out of control for the past few years, but this was my rock-bottom moment. I woke up in my bed at my parents’ house with no memory of how I had gotten there; all I could remember was having one of my many alcohol-fueled blowouts with Nick, and I had left my apartment in downtown Salt Lake to try to come out to see him, about 15 miles away. It wasn’t the first time I had blacked out, by any means, but in the past, no one really saw how bad it was. Nick knew, but he didn’t know how to help me. He and I had been in a tug of war over my drinking for the past year and a half, basically from the beginning of our relationship. Despite my many promises I had made over the past few weeks to stop cold turkey, I couldn’t stop. But that morning was the final straw. I broke down just sobbing hysterically when it finally started to hit me that I couldn’t just control my drinking. I was an alcoholic and I needed help.

I am so, so grateful for my friend Matt I had met my first year of college. I don’t know if I would be here today if he hadn’t been someone I could reach out to during that very dark time. He had moved out to Utah from Michigan, after he was sent away to boarding school because of his drug and alcohol abuse. He had been sober for three years at that time. I called him that Sunday and asked him if he would go with me to AA. He took me that very night to my first meeting, which happened to be a meeting specifically for young adults. He told me I must stand and do the standard, “Hi, my name is Julie, and I’m an alcoholic.” I struggled for so long to feel comfortable calling myself that. I was from a good family, living in an affluent, Mormon suburb of Salt Lake, a college graduate (nearly, at that point. This was just about a week before my graduation day.) How could I be an alcoholic? But I confronted it that first night, and finally started to feel a twinge of relief. At least I had finally figured out that I had a serious problem, and now I just had to fix it.

I kept going to meetings, for that entire first year. Every milestone – 30 days, 60, 90, you would get a chip. They were the hardest earned pieces of plastic I’ll likely ever have. I didn’t “work” the program, though. Of course, I have to do things my way, because I am stubborn and I know best. I got a sponsor, but I never called her. I white-knuckled it through the first six months, as my therapist at the time called it. I went to meetings but never hung around to talk afterwards. I didn’t work the steps, as I was supposed to. A lot of the fundamental AA principles were really hard for me to wrap my head around. “Let go and let God.” I understood and agreed with the concept that there is a power greater than myself. But where it starts to get fuzzy for me is when I was to turn my life and will over to a power greater than myself, and that would “restore me to sanity.” I feel that I am the only one responsible for making the choices I did. And I am the one who got myself to the place I am today. It was by accepting responsibility for my careless and wreckless decisions, and making the choice to stay sober.

Alcohol became a coping mechanism so I didn’t have to deal with pain in my life. I really started to drink after high school, after I had a falling out with some of my dearest friends. Drinking was the fun thing to do at college parties, but one night I had one drink at a party, at some friend of a friend of a friend’s house, blacked out for a bit only to wake up being sexually assaulted in some darkened room by someone, and there were others in the room, but I don’t really remember much other than that. I blacked out again to wake up back in my dorm room the next morning. I didn’t tell anyone what had happened at that time. I didn’t really understand what had happened. I didn’t know if I’d had more to drink than I should, or if someone had slipped something in my drink. But I felt responsible, like it was my fault for putting myself in that situation. My drinking got much, much heavier after this, as I pushed the incident down inside me instead of talking to someone about it. By my junior year I was drinking every day, before going to work at the call center, before going to some of my classes at night even, and every night before bed. I started to date Nick and alcohol was always an issue between us from the get go. I was hurting him so badly, but the drinking was more important than anything else at that point. We had fight after fight about it. I am so grateful that he never stopped fighting me over it, because I know that is a major reason why I knew I could be sober – to keep him in my life.

I stopped going to meetings after about a year, but I stayed sober. Two years passed, and still I was sober. It’s not to say that a switch flipped off and I was instantly OK. It was painful, and the most difficult period of my life. But I believe that if you want to stop, truly, you can stop. I didn’t want that kind of life. I tried to “turn it over to a higher power” but I know that the truth is, my strength came from within myself. I am the one who decides every day to not take a drink. Seven years and counting.

So every mile of my run today was dedicated to each year of staying strong, and staying sober. I have gained so much through sobriety, and I am so grateful that I am here today.

20

I ran my first 20 miler on Saturday. I managed to even run almost the whole time, although when I hit 19 miles I took a break to walk just because my knees were starting to feel achy.  It was a HUGE improvement on the 18 miler I did a couple weeks ago; I was just mentally unprepared going into that one, and started walk breaks by mile 6. I did cover the full 18 miles, but it wasn’t pretty.

So when I set out Saturday, I was going to GO for it. I went to bed early Friday night, and set my alarm for 6:30 so that I would be out running by 7, since the temps were soaring this weekend and I HATE running in the heat. I ran up from the parking lot all the way to the end of the trail, almost 5.5 miles, and then looped back down to my car. I stopped for a minute to drink some water in my car, and then I took off again for a second 4.5 mile loop. I felt kind of funny passing people three or even four times on the trail! I took a Gu at about the 7 mile marker, and then another one around mile 13 or 14. (I also ate a piece of saltwater taffy that was in my car when I stopped for water after 11 miles, which was a nice treat ) I finished the 20 miles (actually, my Garmin said it was 20.06) in 3 hours, 41 minutes. That was about an 11:02 minute pace. For the actual marathon, of course my goal is just to finish, but my super secret goal is to finish in 4:30. (If I’m truly being honest, I want to beat Oprah’s time of 4:29:20.) According to my half marathon finishing time, I should be able to run just under 10:30 minutes per mile and come in right around 4:34, so with a little extra effort, I could do it. But I also know that I won’t have any idea what those final 6.2 miles are like until race day, and I  can only hope to hold on to finish strong.

I have 2 cutback weeks in a row planned, since I had to shuffle my schedule around a bit due to traveling to Utah and our vacation last week. Then I will run my final long run of 20 miles on May 9, and then it will be time to taper! I can’t believe how quickly time is flying. It’s kind of scary.

Whirlwind

Well, this past week has been pretty crazy. I finished my half marathon this past Saturday (much more on that in a minute), and then rushed home, showered, and drove out to Burbank to fly to Salt Lake for a visit. It was pretty crazy to cram so much into such a short time, but that’s me!

I woke up around 5:30 on the morning of the race. I was totally nervous but I knew I had prepared to the best of my ability, and now it was time to just run. I had gotten everything prepared the night before, including pinning my race number onto my shirt, attaching my timing chip to my shoe, buying some new songs on iTunes, charging my iPod and Garmin, setting food and water out. All I had to do in the morning was get up. I got to the parking lot around 6:55, and the race didn’t start until 7:30, which was great because I wanted to get a mile and a half warm-up in.

It was SO cold up there. One lady said her car said it was 38 when she got out. My legs were turning a lovely shade of purple by the time the race finally started, at almost 7:40. My hands were numb for about the first mile, and then I finally started to warm up. We started out up the hill out of the parking area, and then turned to run down and up the “rolling” hills. The first couple of miles I was doing just great, despite having a 10:30 mile for Mile 1, due to crowding at the start and an extremely narrow bridge we had to run down. Miles 2 and 3 were run at 9:32 and 9:39, respectively. Then came the giant hill.

Elevation profile from my Garmin

I ran up that whole hill, without stopping once. I wasn’t going fast, I was just going strong; I averaged a pace of 10:34 for that mile. I was so damn proud of myself by the time I got to the top I was about to let out a yell. I was PUMPED. I had the biggest shit-eating grin on my face, I felt a little overcome with emotion. Then came a luxurious long, long stretch of downhill. I was sure that the worst was over. The path went down along Lake Malibu, along shady tree-lined streets and some really beautiful homes. And then the hills started again.

It wasn’t so bad at first. I took a Vanilla Gu at around mile 7, and mentally cursed myself for forgetting a plastic baggie to stick the wrapper in after I finished. I had to hold it in my hand for the next mile and a half until I came upon the next water station where I could throw it away, and by that point the remnants had leaked ALL OVER my fingers. So annoying and sticky. We looped back around to where we started, and the rolling hills we had run in the first couple miles had to be repeated. This time they didn’t seem quite so easy, but I was still holding on. Then we veered off onto a different road that took us up and over the freeway. Somewhere between miles 10 & 11 I started to run out of steam as the hills just kept coming. I had to finally resort to walking for a minute.

Up to mile 10, I had run all but 2 miles under 9:45 minutes per mile, and even hit one mile on the downhill at under 9 minutes. The hills had left my legs feeling rubbery though, and even though I knew mentally I only had about 5K left, I was getting really tired. I only ended up walking a few times, for a total of about 3 and a half minutes, but I wanted to finish strong. It was starting to get hot out by this time too. I hit Mile 12 and I knew we were almost there. The last mile we shot out onto a dirt path which was totally unexpected and a little tricky with uneven footing. The end was downhill, thank god, and I sprinted to the finish.

I wasn’t really thinking about much other than the fact that I was exhausted as I crossed past the finish line, but when I went over to the exit they were giving out medals to all of the finishers. All of the sudden I was overcome with emotion over what I finally was able to do – run a half marathon. I definitely had a few tears in my eyes as the lady gave me my medal.

My final time was 2 hours, 9 minutes, and 55 seconds. I was thinking around Mile 10 that I was going to be able to hang on and get in around 2:06, but unfortunately, the hills did me in. But after hearing from some of the other runners who have done half-marathons before, this was a pretty hard race and I am absolutely satisfied with my time. I know that I could’ve probably come in another 5 minutes or so faster if the route had been flat, but I’m actually glad it was such a challenge and that I managed to do as well as I did.

I was so, so sore for two days after the race though. I was hobbling around like a little old lady. I know I should’ve gone home right after and taken an ice bath, but instead I drove for 30 minutes home, showered and packed my last minute items, and then drove another hour out to Burbank, and spent an hour and a half on the plane. All that sitting stiffened my muscles up right away. I felt good enough to go for a run Tuesday morning, but didn’t get a chance until Wednesday. I ran 4 miles, and my calves were still a little achy but I still felt pretty good considering how hard I ran on Saturday.

And yesterday, my entire world got thrown into a state of upheaval. Nick got a job offer from the Standard-Examiner in Ogden, and he accepted. I’m going to be moving at the end of May…oh wait, isn’t my MARATHON at the end of May? Yeah. I have no idea how this is going to work. I am so overwhelmed with everything I know that lies ahead, especially now that I know everything it takes to move to another state. I am so torn between being happy for Nick and for what this means for our future, and being totally devastated that I have to leave everything we’ve come to know and have here. I don’t want to leave California.