Space Coast 1/2 Marathon

 

This morning I did my first running event since finding out I was pregnant almost 2 years ago.

At the end of last school year, my friend and co-worker LeAnn came up to me and told me that one of her "bucket list" items was to run a half marathon and asked if I could guide her.  I did one better, I told her I'd do it with her...

and so our training began!

I started her off with the Couch to 5K program, and since I was so far out of the running loop as well, I did it too.  Then we progressed on to an actual half marathon training program....but I went and got SICK SICK SICK for 3 weeks leaving me only 2 weeks until race day.

Race day = TODAY!

It was a beautiful...albeit EARLY... morning!  LeAnn and her husband picked me up around 4:45am (Hubby and Baby Girl were going to meet us up there a little later) so we had plenty of time to stretch and get psyched up for the big blastoff (It was space themed for the SPACE coast...what do you expect other than a "3...2...1...BLASTOFF" kind of start?).

We were feeling fantastic and hit the halfway mark before we even knew it!  We even saw some dolphins jumping in the river which we took as a good luck sign :)

We were doing great until the last mile and a half...then all of a sudden my calf seized up on me in a massive cramp!!!  OUCH!!  I slowed to a walk for the first time just before the 12 mile mark, then stopped outright to give it a good stretch before toughing it out for the last mile.  LeAnn never stopped but did slow down enough for me to catch up to her (she was afraid that if she stopped, her legs would refuse to start again -- I can't blame her!!)

At the very end she and I broke into an all out sprint (which after 13 miles isn't very sprinty but we felt like it was!).  She finished seconds ahead of me (which I will publicly say is because of my calf, however the truth is I think she had more in her than I did at the end, plus she had the adrenaline of knowing her first marathon medal was waiting on her!).

It was an awesome run and I am so proud of LeAnn!!!  We have decided that we want to sign up for another one in late February!!

LeAnn and I with our new bling

Baby Girl and I after a sweaty reunion