Vancouver USA Half Marathon

Totally had a blast at my first Vancouver USA Half Marathon! I was so excited to do this race - which is so odd for me, but I figured out that it's because so many good things were in place...

I worked REALLY hard to get better for this race, even through the pain I was having in my neck/shoulder since the beginning of April. I think I might have cut a couple of training runs short or skipped one or two because of that problem, but for the most part I stuck to the plan. We even started to do some Tabata for some strength training. I think we'll keep that in the arsenal, if we are consistent it will totally make a difference!

Our times were good - I now have a PR in my half at a fraction of a second over 3 hours. That's pretty much 10 minutes better than my first half AND on a course that was far more hilly. Crazy! Tom's finish time was 2 hrs 12 min - SO PROUD of him!

I "crammed" with my nutrition - which means that I didn't pay as much attention to it in the earlier weeks until the last couple of weeks. Day of race I got up early and had some breakfast and went back to sleep for a little bit before getting ready to head to Esther Short Park. I was so hyped about racing that I didn't really care that my sleep was on the lighter side.

Anyway, a race is a race and I guess my favorite part of the whole route was going from McLoughlin blvd all the way to 5th Street - without a walk break. I actually probably did a mile and half without psyching myself out and walking. I stopped to walk just to grab a GU and get some drink before starting up again. That took a lot of me telling my legs that I don't have to go fast, I just have to keep going.

The ultimate revelation is that now that we are doing the longer running events, it's about going slow and getting to the end. I see 5k events almost like a sprint anymore - those end so quickly. I think I'm embracing longer distance running (GASP!)

We'll have a nice and easy race coming up on the 4th - our 6th(?) Independence Run in Ridgefield. Then we start training for the North County Wine Run - half marathon in September.