AllState Fort Lauderdale Half Marathon

Last year this race was my first half marathon ever, and this year it was on of my friends. After bugging her for months she finally agreed to try a half marathon.

There were originally suppose to be a bigger group, but in the end just the two of us stood ready at the start line. 

The one thing about these long runs is the start time. 6:30 am suxs, I don't care who you are. It's not something I've gotten use to over time, I still have to force myself outta bed when the alarm blares at 5 am. 

But this race was exciting, I had one of my best friend & running partner there with me & the new Dan Brown book set in my iTunes. 

The race starts & I know I am not going to set a new PR or anything, but I'm still feeling pretty good, I zone out and fall into fantasy land (my book), until I am jerked back into reality as I hear my name being called from somewhere.

Passing my friends boyfriend...mile 8. It's great to get cheered on, but I honestly think if have gone all 13 miles zoned out if I hadn't been snapped back into reality. 

Now every mile ticked by & when my pgs told me I had hit 13 miles I couldn't seen the finish line! No the finish line was hidden around the distant corner .72 miles away. 

Let me just say that a half marathon is suppose to be 13.1 NOT 13.72 miles & those last .62 miles sux because you know you should be done right now, letting your sweaty sand covered body dry, downing water & shoveling food into your mouth. 

By the time I finally crossed the finish line I could have eaten a small animal. My stomach had turned itself inside out. I need to bring food with me on these long runs! Burning around 1600 calories in under 2 hours...food is a must! 

But it was a good race & you can't pass up on the free beer afterwards :-) 

This year I'm doing 4 of the 5 in the Storm Series...this was #1. Next up, Miami ING.

The only reason I'm not doing all 5 is the one in West Palm Beach doesn't have race day packet pick-up. That's too much gas money to drive back & forth 2 days & staying over night, then I have the hotel & to pay for a dog sitter, I'm already doing that for Sarasota...one is enough! 

Weston Half Marathon - AKA The Run of Death

I should have known better that after coming back from the blinding cold of England to the warm perfection on South Florida I would get sick...but with my normal voracity, I though I was invincible, until I fell victim to the full, just in time for my Half Marathon...AKA...The Run of Death!

Now doing a 5K feeling a little stuffy, but doing a Half Marathon (13.1 grueling miles) with a full blown flu with nauseous, fever, dizziness the works is beyond a lot worse.

From the time I got home Friday night until the time I woke up for the race Sunday morning, I left my bed for food and bathroom...nothing more. Saturday night I felt so horrible that I spent have the night curled up on the bathroom flood debating if I was going to even live to see the morning.

When my alarm finally went off Sunday I wanted to die, but I dragged my sorry ass outta bed and to the race. I down a few more then the suggested daily intake of some Tylenol cold and flu (the good stuff from behind the counter, not that cheap imitation stuff they try to pawn off on you from shelf), told myself it was only 2 hours....then I could go back to bed and die. Plus, I didn't die last night so I was good right...WRONG!

I meet up with my friend at the race & I know I will go faster then her (if only by a little), so if all else fails she will see me dead on the road and be able to alert my loved ones.

The race starts and the meds have kicked in by this time so I am actually off to a good start. 8:39 min miles...not to shabby I tell myself, I am not dying after all...I can do this right...but 8:39 min miles turns into 9:36 min miles and by mile 8 I have convinced myself that gods themselves are going to come down off Olympus and mock me as I fall dehydrated and dry-heaving to the ground to be trampled under the feet of real runners and walkers who are now passing me as I jog pathetically along at 10:36 min miles.

How much worse can it get I tell myself. The sun is beating down on my deprecated body and I struggle with each breath as the dry heat sucks the air from me. Sure death is standing just up ahead ready to cut my down with his scythe, I struggle on.

**After the race, I find out that the conditions were some of the worse for a race and the humidity etc had taken many races down**

Convinced I have passed the point of no return into delirium I begin to notice others around me. We pass a Firehouse and a very fit couple turn off the course and run up to the station flagging down one of the firefighters. I see more than normal police on bikes riding by and many times with people on the back of them. Convinced I am hallucinating I lean again a pole trying to get the world to stop spinning. I know my body just wants to rest, but having just passed mile 11, how can I give up now.

A police officer scares me half to death and awakes me from what I believe may have been me falling into death asks me if I am OK. Sucking it up, I tell him I was just catching my breath and I push myself back up right...as I seemed to have slid down the pole slightly and set off again...at what I have decided we will call a fast walk....2 more miles until I can collapse.

Just 2 more miles...and dear god where they the longest 2 miles of my running life!

Mile 12 - 11:43 min and Mile 13 - 12:13 min

If it hadn't been for this guy running along next to me, I may have just crawled to the finish line. But he ran up next to me and ran with me for the last 1.5 miles...well more like speed walked, but at this point in time, I am not going to pick and choose what I call it. In my mind at that moment I was just pleased to be moving.

Crossing that finish line was the biggest accomplishment ever. I think I had sweat out every last bit of flu. I drank 4 bottles of water and pretty sure I pushed a little kid out of the way to get more.

That was truly The Run of Death! But I overcome it and defeated it! :) Take that B!Tche$!!!

Sarasota Half Marathon

My friends and I have been talking about doing an out of town race for a while, so when the Sarasota Special came up, my friend and I jumped on it. 

We signed up WAY in advance, but what we didn’t count on was how many other people would be signing up. We ended up waiting a little too long to get a hotel and because of that I had to leave my little man with a friend and we had to stay at her cousins house instead.

We headed Saturday afternoon, unfortunately too early for me to go to Kickboxing first, and drove out to the west coast of Florida. It was awesome. I had only been out to the west coast of Florida a handful of times, and all of them included men, and none of which I am proud of! LOL. I could tell you the stories, but I will save them for another day. I am pretty sure if you look back in my blogs, you can find something about them…anyway.  But this time was all about running and that made it the best trip out West yet! 

We got there Saturday afternoon and headed over to Fit2Run to get our packets and to meet up with this lady, I talked about her in my Miami ING blog, to pick up some hand painted running themed wine glasses (which rocked btw!). The Place was packed and we ended up walking around, checking out all the discounted products, had lunch and stopped by Total Wines (I needed something to fill up my new running wine glasses with!) and I even got a new pair of running shoes. 

**The Running Shoes SUCKED by the way, I found out a few days later, when those POS shoes gave me shin splits, Gawd I hope it goes away soon! – waste of $$ if you ask me!**

We headed over to her cousins house and he and his wife ended up being two of the coolest people I have ever meet! Both were so friendly and outgoing and made me feel at home. It was so nice of them to open up their home to me, even though they had never met me. Her cousin even cooked up an amazing spaghetti and shrimp dinner! I ate so much, but all good right…I was running 13.1 miles the next day :)

After dinner we hung out, I had some wine and we watched that movie….Life of Pi. Um…that was a horrible movie btw, do not waste your time with it. Yes it was pretty to look at but really the story line kinda sucked and I hate when they try to put a surprise twist into a movie that you get 10 minutes into it and then expect me to be surprised when it is reviled at the end. I am not a 5 year old child! Come on now!

The day of the race was an early and kinda chilly start, especially for March, but everyone kept telling me it’s colder on the west coast. Whatever, I hate being cold! We go there nice and early and we were ready to do it! I was pumped, people were walking around, photographers were taking pictures and you could just feel the air of excitement.
The course was beautiful, we got to go over a few bridges and at one of them, some guy was out filming the runners on a camera attached to an RC Helicopter. I was very proud of myself overall, but between mile 10 and 12, I was pretty sure I was going to die! I could feel my feet starting to ache and I was ready to sit down and have some water, but once I hit mile 12 and knew I only had a mile left, I got a second wave of energy and managed to finish off strong. 

Crossing that finish line felt amazing! It always does, but when I saw I had set a new PR for my half marathon times, I was ecstatic! 

We found out after we had all finished that my friends cousins wife (that’s a mouth full) actually showed up and decided last minute to run it…never run a half marathon in her life…and finished it! Talk about an accomplishment to be proud of! WHOOHOO! 

Not only did I get a bad ass medal for the Sarasota Half Marathon, but I also got a medal for completing 3 of the 5 Marathon/Half marathons in the US Road Runners Storm Series!

We headed back home shortly after the race, but it really was a good one, I am looking forward to doing it again next year! :)

My 9th Race of 2013 is going to be the Riverwalk 5K. We did it last year, so we figure we should do it again! :)

Publix A1A Half Marathon

Yup That is how cold I was!!!

I kinda waited till last minute to sign up for this race and when I finally did, surprise, none of my friends wanted to do it with me….so this was yet another lone race in 2013. It seems to be becoming a trend!

I was there nice and early so I didn’t have to worry about parking and called my mum at 5 am to bother her to keep me company since no one else was awake and anyone besides her would have just hung up on me and ignored me when I called back. LOL

But seriously, it must have been the coldest it has EVER been in Florida in February! OMG I was already frozen before the race even started. Everyone was huddled around and dressed in “Floridian winter running apparel”. All I had was a pair of long SKIN pants and a little sleeveless jacket on and I didn’t take the jacket off the entire race. People were walking around with plastic trash bags on trying to keep out the blistering cold, maybe for you folks up north high 30’s is nothing…laughable, but for us poor tropical people, that is just rude weather! 

Once the race started, I though, foolishly that it would warm up…haha, I was stupid wrong. As soon as we got to A1A the wind and sand whipping off the ocean made it even colder! I wanted to die, I couldn’t feel my noes by the time I hit the 3^rd mile marker, but I think the cold made me run faster. 

The race went up and down A1A and also around Huge Taylor Park, which was really nice. But when we hit mile 4…I had to pee. I have never had to pee in a race before and I am SO not a big fan of porter potty’s. They are filthy and disgusting, so I figured I would just go ahead and hold it….and I did…until I got to mile 8. That is right, I held it for 4 MILES, but I couldn’t hold it any more and I started looking for a potty that I could just run into really quickly and then run out, but for the next mile, EVERY single porter potty I passed had a line outside of it. I think the cold made everyone have to pee! It was horrible, so I am running along, making GREAT timing BTW and finally just after mile 9 I see a free porter potty and I DIVE into it. I must have taken the longest pee on record. I am squatting over the disease infested hole, praying to god that nothing gross is living in there and hoping nothing splashes back up onto my precious behind. As I squat I stare at my watch…and watch the seconds…and then MINUTES tick by as I continue to pee. WTH right, who pees that long? Apparently this girl! I peed for just over 2 minutes and all I am thinking during that time, besides oh god I hope nothing gets on my ass, is damn it dame it, I was making such good time! CRAP! How I am going to pick it up and finish strong! 

Well with an empty bladder I came barreling out of the craproom and picked up the pace. Thanks to the frozen ocean wind whipping my face and the inability to feel the pain in my feet because they officially went numb around mile 7, I managed to pound it out and finished much better than I expected! I broke my half marathon record and came in with a NEW PR of 1:53:12 and actually was 25th in my age group! That may not sound awesome to you hard core runners, but I was THRILLED with myself, and I got to enjoy it all alone. Well, to be fair, one of my friends did show up at the finish line to cheer me on and join me for HOT TEA and a mimosa afterwards. 

 

I had a great time doing this race, but the one thing I must say is the medals…they were all broken. I got one at the finish line and by the time I walked to get water it had broken so I went back and asked for another one, which they gave me and it was also broke. Later on Facebook, I saw I wasn’t the only one that got a jackedup medal and they did promise to replace them. We shall see!  

So my next race is the Spartan Race, it will be #7 of the year. Last year I had only done about 3 races by the time I did the Spartan Race and I died, but this year I plan on crushing it! I have been training hard…got myself nice and fit; I am ready to do this! I may not be as ripped as those crossfit girls, but baby, I got me cardio! J

MIAMI ING 2013 – Half Marathon

I was really unsure when I signed up for the Miami Half Marathon. I had done one last November, and I had surprised myself and finished it…in not too shabby a time either (for a newbie) but it was no were near the size or on the scale of the Miami ING.

Since I have the goal of running 24 races this year (2013) I decided to add a little something to it – I wanted 5 of these to be Half Marathons. This will help me in preparing to run my first full (hopefully in 2014)

I had no idea what to expect with the Miami ING but it did not leave me wanting. I had a few friends running it with me and even better, I had a few close friends from my Kickboxing classes coming down to cheer me on as well.

This was officially the largest race I have ever done and I am pretty sure unless I go do the London Marathon, Boston Marathon or something on that level, this will be the biggest race I ever do!  Over 25,000 people showed up and over 24 countries were represented.

We headed down to Miami to pick up our race packets at the Food and Health Expo and we did a little shopping. I didn’t get much, but I did find these awesome wine glasses: Splendid Stems. She had these awesome wine glasses that had great sayings like: I Run for Wine or Bottle of Wine = 475 Calories, or 5 Miles. Yeah, start running!

                Sadly, when I went back after walking the entire expo, she had sold the last I Run for Wine glass, but since I was planning on doing the Sarasota Half and the artist lived in Sarasota, she agreed to let me pick one up when I went out there! Such a nice lady!

On race day, I didn’t have to even consider dragging my butt out of bed! I was psyched and ready to go! My friend drove down and we got there nice and early so we could find parking and get to the start line. We didn’t want to feel rushed and I am glad we weren’t, I was awestruck by all the people, the family, the friends, the supporters, the runners! It was amazing to be a part of something like that.

This was the first time I had also ever had to go into corals, depending on your speed. When I had registered for the ING, I hadn’t even run my first half yet, and I had no idea what my time would be so I had put in something like 3 hours, but after the Fort Lauderdale Half Marathon (back in Nov 2012) I knew I would be doing this around 2 hrs and 30 min, so I moved up into a faster coral so I wouldn’t get slowed down….this did not really help.  Besides the people that were at the front of the pack (coral A-C) there were people walking. I believe I ended up in Coral E and from the gun people all around me set off walking, which I always find extremely frustrating. I had to spend a lot of time the first mile, weaving in and out of people walking and stopping to take pictures and talk. I felt like this did effect my time.

I just wish if people are going to walk a race, they go to the back of the line. I don’t understand why they always want to be in the front when they know they are not planning on going very fast at all!

As I ran, it was a beautiful route. We started at the American Airlines Arena and went up and over the bridge out by South Beach and back. There were crowds along the entire route cheering the runners on, it was so encouraging! People were out representing their countries in full force and it was great! I loved seeing the British flag being waved when I turned one of the corners to head back over the bridge!

There were plenty of restrooms (porter potties), water stops and even fruit being handed out along the route. I did see a number of people get pulled or stop from the race for various reasons and quite a few people being cared for by the Medics that were all over the place. You never realize just how pressing a half marathon is on your body until you are miles into it, it is something that you should never just jump into and do, it is something that you should train for and be prepared for!

One thing I noticed was Publix had a huge presents, they even had the Publix’s mile.

When I came down to the last 2 miles, I could feel every muscle in my legs screaming for me to slow down, stop and relax, but when I came towards the 2 mile marker and saw my friends cheering me on, waving at me and holding up signs it really did give me the strength I needed to finish strong! I managed to complete the MIAMI ING in 2:00:19! So much better than I had originally planned, and you know next time I am going to be pushing myself to break 2 hours!

My next race (4^th  of 2013) is the 5K Foam Fest. Should be a nice calm race after this one, especially since it not timed. (If I would have known that I wouldn't have signed up, but oh well, I guess we will just have fun with it!!) 

 :)