late post: Half Mar

 Remember that one time when I ran a half marathon? yeah I didn't think so.  I ran the immigration canyon half about 5 months ago. (labor day weekend of 2012)  This is an accomplishment I am proud of since I have never particularly loved running.  Chelsey (my sister-in-law) is the one who motivated me to do it and through out the beginning of the summer I was up and down about whether or not I would actually do it.  So once I finally registered and started to train Chels told me that she wanted to run with me the whole way. (guys, i'm slow. she's fast.)  She is an avid runner/ lover of all things fitness and has completed many races as well as a FULL marathon.  She's an animal in the fitness world.  It was a fun and memorable experience for me so here it is.  

I started out training during the summer and it was really good motivation for me to work out at least 4 times a week.  Chels and I would do some of our long runs at the cabin.  Those runs were the hardest!  We ran on gravel and I swear the altitude made it so much harder.  Through it all Chels was the greatest, sweetest cheerleader/ motivator. Running with her was so much fun.  She would keep my pace even when she could have been going much faster.

Fall semester was in full swing when it was time for the race.  I drove home to sandy to meet up with chels and the rest of the fam. We had plans to go to our cabin for the weekend,  First we just made a quick pit stop in immigration canyon to run the half and then go straight to pinevalley.  Honestly, that was the greatest motivation of it all.

The night before the race we loaded up on carbs at noodles. YUM.  And then we went shopping for matching shirts.  Tender, huh.  We really wanted to buy these ones that had a picture of a girl on the front that said "don't hate me because i'm perfect."  It was so tempting but we decided we should buy something that we would wear afterwards as well.  darn it. haha  

 The pre-race was great, loaded up on sport beans and such for maximum energy and got pumped up.  There was a lot of time to scope everybody out....in other words our competition.  There was this one guy who was like 80, it was then that I told my 19 year-old self that if this 80 year-old schools me then I needed to reevaluate my life.  

The first 4ish miles were uphill then the rest was just a straight shot down the canyon.  If those uphill miles came any later I would have certainly looked a lot like road kill on the side of the road.  Running the last curve at the top of the canyon was the most liberating thing I have ever experienced probably thus far.  The beginning of the downhill was a beautiful thing.  My legs were free and I felt like I was gliding instead of tromping with each step.  But that only lasted from about miles 4-7. Then I was the most negative, least fun running partner i'm sure.  This is probably when my legs started to chafe and huge blisters formed on each foot. I was in so much pain.  The end killed me and Chels kept me going much to my dismay.  In the above picture to the right Chelsey is literally moving me along with her hand. haha what a GEM. 

To all my friends in middle school gym class who made fun of the way I run...maybe you were right.  (look at the form) ha

At the finish line we were greeted by some of our family/ fan club.  I was a PAL (Pissed at life) kinda girl when it was over.  I could hardly walk because I didn't want to put pressure on my blisters and multiple people came up to me and asked if I was okay.  How embarrassing. It seemed just minutes after finished I was whisked away into a car from anxious siblings who wanted to get to the cabin.  My joints and muscles all stiffened and I looked like a hobo in Park City during a quick stop.  I got out of the car to stretch my legs and ended up sitting on a curb in front of McDonalds like the most homely girl ever.  I even found a little bit of humor in it then.

The entire weekend afterwards I justified everything that I ate because I had a huge work-out before.  And there is always a massive abundance of food at the cabin so that was nice.

and after this....I wanna do it all again.