Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon-Half Marathon

Well, I did it!!!!!!!!  I ran my first half marathon in 2:44.30!  30 seconds under my goal time.  I had a good time with this race!

I was really nervous before the race.  James, Mike, mom and dad were great at trying to calm me down.  Here is James and before the race.

The size of the race was amazing!  The energy was amazing!  It was just a great race!

I started out too fast.  I felt really good and just let my legs run, but it was too fast.  I was 1:10 at the 10k mark.  Just off my best 10k time.  Not so hot for a half marathon.  I followed my plan and at the 10k mark I walked so I could eat my stingers and drink some Gatorade.  I still felt pretty good until about the 16k mark.  Then I could feel my muscles start to get tired.  I walked again to get the rest of my stingers and some more Gatorade.  At the 19k mark, my muscles were dead.  I had to walk a few minutes to get my legs under me for the rest of the race.

When I crossed the finish line I felt so good at having finished the race!  My legs were dead the rest of the day, but I did it!  I enjoyed running this distance.  It's just a good distance and a doable distance training wise. 

Here I am after the race.

I liked this distance so much, that I entered another half marathon on June 1st.  It will be the Niagara Falls Women's Half Marathon.  I'm excited and ready to do the training.

As of right now, my next goal race is the Robbie Burns 8k in January.  I'm going to be training for that starting next week.  This week I'm using to recover and do short runs to get my legs back.  Today I went for a short 2 mile run with River.  My legs are still pretty tired, but the run felt good.  It is getting cold out though.  I had to pull out my running tights and long sleeve shirts.  Brrrrr....I don't know that I'm ready for the cold weather yet.  Tomorrow I'm going to the gym to do the bike and Friday I'm taking another short run.  Sunday we have a 5k race that we are doing.  It's the Monster Dash in Toronto.  James and I are dressing up.  It should be a fun Halloween themed race.

I just have to get my legs rested and then I can get back on a training schedule and back in the gym for weights.  This race really got me motivated to keep running and to try the longer distances.

Happy Thursday!

It's hard to believe that it's Thursday already!  The week has really flown by.  I had some sort of bug or cold or something that knocked me down for 2 days.  I just felt icky, but not really sick.  Two days of rest helped though.

Today I got up feeling much better and went to the gym.  I did hill intervals on the treadmill.  I did a nice, slow, easy warm up then pushed outside my comfort zone on the hills.  I really don't like hills so these intervals were tough for me, but I did them.  After my cool down I did weights focusing on legs today.  I increased the weight on several machines so it was tough.  I will feel it in the morning.  I have a light run scheduled for tomorrow.  It's supposed to be 2-4 miles.  I'm hoping to get in closer to 4 miles since I didn't run Tuesday and may not get to run Saturday.

Tomorrow we head to Indiana to see my parents and for my 20th class reunion.  It should be a good time.  James is coming with us and my brother and SIL will be there with my neices and nephew.  Yesterday I made unicorn poop cookies to bring down with us.  James and I made those a few weeks ago and they are pretty good.  They are fun to make as well.  Here are the ones from yesterday.

They take awhile to make, but the look cool.  I think the girls will love them!

Today I have to finish laundry and pack.  We are leaving tomorrow around 3pm.  I'm really looking forward to it!

Have a great day!