philly half

all ready for the race!

so this weekend i went up to philly to see two of my lovely crew ladies where we had a mini reunion and ran in the philly half marathon!
it was a great time and we had fun catching up and talking about running and the college days.

i took the train up saturday and met jeanne and chelsea at the expo. we also quickly met up with a sorority sister of mine from college who was also running and chatted with her for a while! yay running bringing people together!

so after the expo where we picked up our bibs and everything else we headed back to jeanne's and carbo loaded at jeanne's favorite italian restaurant - which is delish. i've eaten there so many times! and then we continued to chat about life and everything while watching movies and being lazy before going to bed at 9:30. haha! wild saturday night! but hey, we were getting up at 4:30 to go run 13.1 miles!

favorite picture from college

so i know i've written about it before. but the 5 ladies i rowed with in college are just amazing and such an inspiration to me. i ran my first half marathon in 2010 with 2 of them in the town we went to college. we are all off doing some amazing things in our lives and while we don't see each other that often when we do it is great. so running the half with jeanne & chelsea, and knowing a 4th was off in kansas running a full marathon. so we still push each other 6 years later!

so we were up bright and early and made our way downtown to run. we hit a ton of traffic going in but still made it in time to to wait in the porta potty lines and get to our corral no problem. and since we got there kinda late we weren't standing around too much before! here we are before jeanne left to go to her corral, since she was earlier than we were! wooo pre-race!

ready to run!

jeanne, chelsea and i pre-race! wooooo!
 

so chelsea and i made our way to our corral and took off our throw-aways. best $5 i ever spent on sweats! and then got in line to start!

you can see the start line!

favorite sign of the day! this was right before the start! 

chelsea and i right before we started!

while the race started at 7 - our corral didn't start until right around 7:30. so i was all ready to go! my race plan was to a)finish and not walk b)wanted to finish under 2:30 c)goal of 11 minute miles which was a final time of like 2:24. so i grabbed a pace band at the expo and had the 2:15 & 2:30 ones and after thinking used the 2:15 one and also wrote in the 11 min mile times under. and that was the smartest thing i did. so chelsea and i ran the first mile together and i was at a 10:45 and feeling pretty good. i wasn't too fast and right where i was comfortable. and i just continued running, i didn't see a mile marker for 2 and that kinda threw me off. but when i did pass 3 i was running just over 30 minutes. ummm, so i was going a little faster than i wanted. i tried to slow it down, but miles 4-6 i was right on for the 2:15 finish. so i figured why not try for it. 

running by independence hall! woooooo! i was so pumped to see this and think about the constitution!
yes, i know i'm crazy. 

and the great thing about running through philly was the people cheering and the fun atmosphere on the streets. it really does help! i loved laughing at the signs as i ran past! so around mile 8 it had a slight incline and this was where i started to feel it. and miles 8-10 were a bit rough. this was a bit of the hilly part of the half course and where i get tired in a race. so i started to slip on my times. but as long as i was hitting under the 11 minute miles i had written in i was happy! so after i hit 10 miles, right by the please touch museum, i was like ok. i got this. 3 miles. 33 more minutes. and so i continued to push through. and i never saw marks for 11 miles - so i had no idea on my pace. i was just hoping i was where i wanted to be! and then i saw 12 and i was happy with my time. and for mile 12 you ran along the waterside of boathouse row - which made the rower in me SO happy! i needed that little push - plus running it with 2 of my rowers made it great. and so there is a coxswain recording i used in college the mornings of races and i keep it on my mix - it is mary whipple - my idol coxing the 2003 worlds and it is just great. so i put that on for mile 12 and just had her voice while running the last mile. and when i got to the top of the half marathon/marathon split i pushed it even more, and then i went into a sprint for the last few little bit to cross the finish line! woooooo!

 i was so happy when i saw my time. i finished in 2:22:10. so i ran 10:53 splits. i was sooo happy! my mom had been getting my texts while i ran so i immediately had one from her and i made my way through all the lines to see how my friends did. i met up with jeanne who finished with her goal of sub 8 splits! woo! and then chelsea came in right after me at 2:26 and she beat her goal of under 2:30! so we were all happy!

wooo! finished the 13.1! 

so after we headed to an early lunch and the walking felt soooo good! but i wasn't feeling too well after the race - my stomach was killing me. so i wasn't feeling too great after. and then we all headed back to jeanne's house to shower before chelsea and i headed back home. i had a bit of a wait in amtrack station before my train, but it wasn't too bad. the worst part was when i got into dc i had just missed the metro, so i had to wait 18 minutes for the next one. uuuugh! i was so sore and tired. all i wanted was my bed!

and today - was rough. i was so sore. my legs were killing me! i don't remember hurting this bad last time! and i don't think being at work all day at my desk or in meetings helped! but i was so happy that i did such a kick ass job!

the 3 of us were talking about doing the pittsburgh half in may! so adding that should be fun! we've decided it will be a fun tradition to keep up with. trading our oars for running shoes! i need to email our coach to let him know about our run this weekend!

so i'm proud that i finished my second half marathon. that 11 months after knee surgery i was able to run 13.1 miles and not only run it, but be successful. i didn't hit my pr and i'm ok with that because i knew that wasn't going to happen. and i love that i'm now running with girls i rowed with in college. and that we continue to push ourselves after college.