New 1/2 Marathon PR!

Yesterday was a great day. I ran in the Mad Anthony Half Marathon and set a new PR!

Had you asked me 48 hours ago if I thought this was going to happen, I would have set no, due to several unexpected circumstances leading up to the race.

1. I wasn't planning on running this race. I was originally planning on running a race last Saturday, but due to my procrastination, registration filled up before I registered. Because of this, I had to extend my training plan a week.
2. I only ran once the week before the race, due to circumstances beyond my control.
3. I pretty much ate crap all week (i.e. pizza several times throughout the week and Mexican food the night before).

Despite all of this (or maybe because of it...pizza might just be my best fuel food!), I had my best race ever! The weather was absolutely perfect, the course was beautiful and not too hilly or too flat, and my legs were very rested. My time was 1:56:50.  I didn't bonk at all and the miles flew by!

Happy as a clam the whole time!

Perfect weather!

The things that made this race so much better than the last one were the weather and my training schedule. When it was so hot at the race in June, I felt like I needed to drink so much water, which just made me cramp because I am not used to drinking that much during a run. For the race in June, I ran 12 miles the week before the race, leaving my legs pretty tired. This time, I just ran 8 miles last week on my long run and rested the 4 days before the race this week, leaving me feeling ready to run.



The biggest thing I learned though, was how important it is to get up and try again! During the race in June, I thought I would never run again, I was so miserable. There were even times while continuing my training for this one that I wanted to quit because I was getting bored and it just wasn't fun anymore. But I kept going because I didn't want my training to be for nothing and I knew that it was important to have a good race to help get rid of the memory of the bad one. And it paid off! It was so fun and I'm so glad I stayed with it. Now it's time for a break...:)

Looking back at all of the races I have done (I just added a box on the side to help me keep track of them) has helped me realize that I am getting faster! While it may only be a few minutes at a time, there has been improvement. It's also cool to realize that I have done races in 6 different states (excluding 5k's and 10k's). It will be fun to see how many states I will hit by the time I am done with my racing career!