Saturday, August 22

So today was "the" day. Not "the the" day, but that one on the training calendar that has brought some dread and "ugggghhhhs" since I received the training guide over some three months ago.

13 miles.

Really? I have to run the half before I run the half? I have always done training programs that ended at 10 miles, so these last few weeks have all been new to me.

As Saturday drew closer, I was actually kind of excited about it and not as nervous as I almost felt like I should be.

I packed up my supplies the night before - tons of Gu chomps in my SPI belt, water bottle, hat, moleskin for my blisters, etc.

We met that morning, chatted, stretched, and were off. Basically our plan was to run to Summerfield and back. (!) We lucked out with overcast skies and shade on this course.

We had a pretty big group that was all sticking together and it started breaking up when we got further into Bur Mil. All of a sudden, M. and I noticed that E. was a little further back then she had been. We knew she wasn't a fan of big packs like we were in, so we didn't think much about it. We looked again and she wasn't there. Liz caught up to us and told us that she wasn't feeling well and they had stopped and called her husband to come and pick her up. This was awful news ... we knew how devastated she would be, but she's also one of our group of three! We've all become so used to running together that it's hard when one of us isn't around. Her son had been sick, so we thought she must have caught this bug. Yuck. We had to keep going, but we both just felt so bad for E.

We made it to our turnaround point and then had to run about a mile or so back to get to the cooler with Gu, bananas, Gatorade, etc. We hit the restroom, fueled up and were back on the Greenway.

It took me a while to get my legs going again ... they felt like they just weren't moving. I ate a couple of Gu's and felt better. It was still hard to believe that we were going to do this!

On the way back, we had some welcome rain. It was really beautiful - not a downpour, but just a nice heavy sprinkle. I was worried that it would get steamy after it finished, but it didn't.

We hit the stoplights and I stopped Garmin for one of them. Bad mistake - I looked down and realized that I never restarted it. Luckily, we figured out that it had been 1/2 mile since we run this course all the time. After some mad math skills, we figured out where we were and what we needed to finish up. We headed to do the "little loop" and then onto Grease Alley.

I think by this point, I just wanted it to be through. We caught up with some of the girls going 12 and made it back to the cars. It was hard not to want to really push it on GA, but we had a little further to go than usual. When we made it back, we asked others what their distance had been and we realized we should do a little parking lot loop. M. and I looked at each other and we were off. Crazy, but I didn't want to have run that far to end up at 12.5. So, we did a little loop and were back to enjoy some much needed Gatorade.

M. had also brought along some ice cold water that was wonderful. E. had left me her bottle of Gatorade that had been chilling in her car. So, so nice.

While the run wasn't easy, it definitely gave me the motivation to know that I can do this in a couple of weeks. I am still worried about heat, humidity, and lack of shade in VB, but what can I do? I do hope I can quicken my time by a little, but if I can finish and feel good, I'll be happy with that as well.

DISTANCE / TIME: 13.09 Miles 2:28:36
FUEL: Pre: Nutrigrain waffle with peanut butter and banana, 1/2 cup of coffee, During: Gu chomps, 1/2 banana at turnaround