Half Marathon Number 5: Complete!

So I thought I was prepared for the hills in this race. You can never be too prepared for hills though! They aren't my idea of fun...although sometimes I can breeze over them, this time not so much!

Weather: 60s and mostly cloudy, cool.

Miles 1-5:  I thought I was doing well.  I kind of was able to actually stay with the 9:33 pacer for most of this time and thought I could actually get under 2:10. 



Then I remembered there was a lot more race to go.  More hills came and the sun came out and it started getting hot at that point. I pushed through, and I was able to maintain around 10 minute miles.  You can see from the course elevation the hills and curves of this course. Beautiful course but hilly!  I thought I got to the 10 mile mark at a decent time considering everything else. The 10 mile time was 1:39.

Sure the overall elevation shows us going downhill.  And I looked at this beforehad and thought after I passed mile 8, it would be a little better. But it was not. Maybe it was because we had already gone 8 miles that made it so much harder to do.  But miles 9-12 seemed fairly flat? I thought?  NOT SO MUCH! lol.

Miles 10-13.1 were torture. I reached my wall. I could not go any further.  I honestly thought that.  I would run a few steps, then stop and run some more then stop again.  I think I kept looking at my watch and the pace was saying close to 11 minute miles for most of that time.

I thought my finish time was 2:15, that is what I saw on the clock when I crossed.  Usually you can subtract time because of starting later than the clock did. But because of my slowed pace and my stopping, I thought that the 2:15 was pretty accurate. Turns out my official time was 2:13:47! I am pleased.. I know I wanted under 2:10 and it seemed possible for a long time but then miles 10-13 hit me hard.

My fastest time for this course is 2:02 and my slowest is 2:24.  I ended up right in the middle. Nothing wrong with that!





A little scare:
I had a lot of stress this week..I was sick Moday-Tuesday with fever, chills, body aches. I also had some bad cramping that had me worried on Tuesday morning. I had to call in sick. Then out of nowhere, my period started on Friday. Yes I am on birth control, the Ortho Evra patch. My period was not due for another week and a half.

I was worried of the worst, "am I having a miscarriage??" I mean we haven't been using any other kind of protection. I thought of the cramps I had on Tuesday - they didn't last long but they hurt. A lot. They went away so I wasn't worried. I called the on-call doctor on Saturday June 1 and I also took a pregnancy test which was negative. I would be devastated if it were positive. The on-call doctor said he wasn't sure the reasoning of this but to use another method of birth control and to continue using the patch as normal. And to call my real OB this week if the bleeding doesn't stop.  UGH it is always something! I can't get pregnant right now because my body is still healing from what happened last year.