... and another first half marathon RR
When the alarm went off this morning, I had a moment of "why the heck did I need to get up at 5am" and then I remembered.... The morning did not start out very well-- it was raining hard and windy. And somehow Pokey, my rather elderly dog, injured his right front leg while he was out in the backyard taking care of his morning necessities. He was really hurting, and could barely make it up the steps to get inside (poor boy). But he curled up on the couch, and seemed comfortable enough there, so I went ahead and raced.
The rain and wind died down for the start of the race, but picked up around the 2 mile mark. It never really went away after that. But once you're soaked, what's a bit more rain? At mile 5ish, the first guy going the other way went by-- he was flying... At mile 6, I joined the line at the porta-potty (it was almost a 3 minute wait). The water stop at the 6.5 mile turn was manned by the kid I sit next to in my church choir; it was awesome to run into a friendly face at that point. Then we turned towards home, and into the wind.... The second half of the race there was less rain, but a whole lot of headwinds... It's kinda a blur in my mind (as it was through my rain-streaked glasses)...
Anyway, the official results aren't up on-line yet, but by my watch my time was roughly 2:08, right what I was hoping for. I'm pretty sure I ran the final mile in under 9 minutes, and passed a bunch of people. (Actually, I was constantly passing folks, post-portapotty break!).
The GOOD: my final time, running so fast in nasty weather conditions, doing my first half
The BAD: the weather, traffic, and the weather. And the truly nasty state of that portapotty...
The UGLY: Pokey getting hurt. He was in a lot of pain when I got home, so I gave him one of his pain pills. He's better, but still hurting. If he's not a lot better tomorrow, it's to the vet we go. I'm afraid he might have broken or dislocated something, he's hurting so much. We do have an emergency vet clinic, BTW, but all they'd do is give him something for pain, and charge way too much....
