Sunday, April 1, 2012

Dallas Rock n Roll Half Marathon

So the half marathon was a week ago, and I'm just now getting around to writing about it.  We started the weekend of with the kids' fun run.  My older son was really excited to run, even more so when he learned that his dad could run with him.  We left pretty early, because traffic near fair park can be atrocious.  No worries on Saturday though, and we made it with plenty of time to spare.  The kindergarten runners went last, so my son was able to see the other groups start and end.  There was a teenage band providing entertainment, and both boys liked dancing.  I will say that nothing makes you feel old like listening to 14 year-olds sing songs that were popular when you were in high school.  It was a bit disconcerting hearing some of the lyrics come out of such young mouths though!

We had gone back and forth about whether to drive to fair park Sunday morning or take the DART train.  Finally decided on the train.  Reading other blogs after the race, I'm glad we took the train, as traffic near fair park was apparently horrible.  We made it to the start area with plenty of time to spare, and took the opportunity to use the porta potties.

We dropped off our bag, found our corral, and then were off!  I actually managed to keep up with my husband for a mile or so, but then he decided that his knee and quad were behaving, and he took off.  My plan had been to walk through all the aid stations, but I was feeling really good at the first one (less than 2 miles into the race), so just grabbed some water and kept running.  I walked through every other one though! I was happy the first 4 miles or so of the race, but after mile 6, I was walking much more than I wanted to.  I started making deals with myself - I'd walk through the end of the song that was playing, but then I had to run to the next mile marker.  When I got to mile 12, I told myself I had to run the last 1.1 miles.  I almost did it too!  But the route through fair park just seemed to go on forever, and before I knew it, my legs were walking.  About 10 steps later, I saw the mile 13 marker, and was pissed at myself.  I made myself start running again, and crossed the finish line just under 2 hours 44 minutes.  A good 10+ minutes slower than my first half marathon.  I was not happy.

I also felt like crap.  I grabbed a bottle of luke warm water, and drank it way too fast.  I was still thirsty, but didn't see any more water - just lemonlime gatorade.  Ick.  I grabbed one anyway, and slowly sipped it.  Finally located my husband (he finished in 1 hour 47 minutes), and we headed for the train station.  I felt sick all the way back, and lost it in the parking lot.  Felt much better after that!

There were some awesome posters along the race route.  "Run, total stranger, run!" "Worst Parade Ever"  "Don't Worry, You Are Way Ahead of the Zombies" were my favorites.

So, on to the next one.  I need to be much better about running during the week, not just doing long runs on the weekends.  I'm off to a terrible start though - no long run this weekend, but I did do the elliptical a few nights this week.

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