SF Half Marathon 2011

Dick, Mom, Me and Esther at the marathon expo on Friday. We were all hoping to just finish the daunting 13.1 miles we faced the next day. All of us weren't as trained as we "should" be but we were all determined to finish, no matter our time.
We went to Parma by my moms house and carbed up with aaamazing pasta. I really enjoyed having Esther to hang with and show my moms house and her hood. I rarely get to bring friends to spend time with the family and I really, really loved it. Esther is such a rad friend and I am so thankful for her.
We woke up at 4:30am to get to the start by 6am. Crazy. I always think we must be half out of our minds to be waking up that early to go run 13 miles. Who does that? Well, actually something like 25,000 people do it. We're all insane together.

 Me and moms right before the start line and we ran into Drew Sorensons sister Stephanie and her daughter. Crazy! Out of all those people and of course Dick sees his friends.

The half marathon was pretty painful for me. I've been struggling with Iliotibial Band Syndrome for the past month. I have really bad pain the in outer hinge joint of my left knee. I know, I just got over shin splints at the beginning of the year and now this!? It sucks so bad. I've been trying to work out the tightness in my quad but it hasn't made much of a difference. I wasn't even sure I'd be able to finish the run after how painful my last few runs have been but I was going to give it my best shot.
The pain started around mile 3 but I held out and popped two more ibuprofen at mile 7. Mile 6-9 were across the Golden Gate Bridge. I was gleaming, smiling the whole way across the bridge through the pain. Running the bridge was definitely a major highlight of my life. I just had to keep my mind on the beautiful sights and not the pain. The weather was perfect. Light fog but you could easily see the city and it wasn't windy at all! Amazing.

After the bridge, the hills really started. One of the worst parts of ITBS is that hills are excruciating. Mile 12, I was over it and needed it to be done. My mom was texting me that she was at mile 13 and that she was soooo over the hills. I was in denial about how many hills there were going to be. Each corner you turned, there were MORE HILLS! Ugh.
But, alas, the end finally came and I finished with a big smile on my face. I had said the day before I would be really happy if I did it in 2:30 and wouldn't you believe I ran it in exactly 2:30! haha. Awesome. I'll take it.

It wasn't my fastest, it wasn't my strongest, it wasn't my best, but thank God, I finished.

 Awhhhhh yeah!!!!

 Still smilin!

I stole this from the newspaper. Ya, I bet you didn't realize what an incline that bridge has huh? Neither did I!!

After some ice, a dip in the jacuzzi and a nap, we went and ate at David and Vasi's. I finally got to eat their cooking. AMAZING! wow!! Along with some good drinks, we were in bed with full bellies by 9:45pm. 10.5 hours of sleep and I woke up feeling great! 

When is the next one? October, Long Beach. Get it!