Lise's Half Marathon Report
Hellllooooo Team Estrogen! Can I tell you one more time how wonderful it is to have found this community? I laugh, I cry, and we hang on every word of each others' race reports. You inspire me, encourage me, and I love being part of this. :D
OK. Here's the story!
The Banco Popular 1/2 Marathon. http://www.chicagohalfmarathon.com/Home.286.0.html
Second year I've done it, and they make a big deal of returning competitors. I got a blue bib instead of a white one for the 1st timers, and my race shirt has "Welcome Back Club Member" on the side. The expo was decent, diminished only by my committment to spend no money, at which I succeeded. My chiro had a booth there, and worked on my elbow for free, which was really sweet.
Got up bright and early to a beautiful day. I felt pretty congested, as I have for a few days, but I told myself, "it's just allergies", used some decongestant snout spray, and took off. Traffic as we approached the race was surprisingly awful, probably because they had a record number of participants (10,000 runners!). I managed to find a parking space, hop on a shuttle bus, scuttle across the very wet grass for a few blocks, and convince the gear check kids to just take my danged backpack because "THE RACE IS ABOUT TO START!" :eek: No problem finding my running pal Jamie. I just stood by gear check and screamed "JAMIE!" She found me. :p When you line up at the back of the pack, you've got some extra time before you start running. Unfortunately, I didn't get to eat the Bloks and drink the water I'd planned, but I knew there was a water station coming pretty soon.
And we're off! It's amazing to me how easy it feels to run in a race compared to training. The day was sunny and clear, not too warm, probably low 70s when we started. The race course started at the Museum of Science and Industry, and ran through part of the University of Chicago campus, where I was an undergrad from '78-'82. Never in a billion years did I dream that I'd turn into an athlete.
At mile 4, I saw a miniature dachshund puppy! That really made me smile. We turned to run up Lake Shore Drive, which was completely closed to traffic from 31st-67th streets. I love my city. It was so gorgeous, the sparkling lake on the east, the beautifully landscaped medians. There was a wide variety of bands playing along the course, ranging from rock to Chinese drummers, to Mexican mariachis, to my favorite, the Hawaiian music complete with hula dancing 10 year old! :D Ate some Gu at about 45 min and 1.5 hr, drank lots at every water station. I wore the shirt I've had made, honoring my dad. It's plain white on the front, with a picture of my dad on the back. After eating my first Gu, I looked down, and noticed that I had a solid line of chocolate Gu dripped right down the middle of my shirt, with a spot of Gu over the left breast for artistic effect. Jamie said, "Don't worry. It looks like a nosebleed." We laughed about "Oh, yeah, when you run as fast as I do, your nose just spontaneously bleeds." I told her to give me some more Gu to glob up under my nose. :p Last year neither of us ate anything on the course, and we finished much more strongly this year.
Around mile 8, Jamie started wanting to walk some, and I started encouraging (nagging) her to run more. I mean, c'mon! I'm 21 years older than she is! We did pretty well until about 1.5 miles from the finish line, when she got downright cantankerous. I thought, "well, I'm not ditching her, so I'd better try to do this without yelling at her, either!" Then the perfect thing happened. The girl next to Jamie started saying, "I can't do this", and Jamie started encouraging her! Before I knew it, we'd all picked up the pace, and were encouraging each other. Sprinted across the finish line with big smiles on our faces (we'll see what the pictures show!) Jamie's husband was there cheering for us. We did it three minutes faster than last year.
We iced down our legs, strolled through the feed zone, took some pictures, and headed back north for breakfast. I ate a Maya bar for some protein. And yes, I had yogurt with my french toast! (does bacon count as protein? :rolleyes: )
Came home and got in an ice cold bath. The moment of sitting down is tough, but it really does feel good after a few seconds. Slept for an hour, and woke up with the symptoms of a full-blown cold. Ugh. I'm going to hit the hay early tonight.
Final time: 2:46. I'll post pix as soon as I've got them. :D
