12/9/12: Holiday Half Marathon

I wasn't planning on running this half due to my Grandpa's declining condition but I kind of got talked into it and it's not really that hard to talk me into anything that involves running! My friend Maura sent me a text in the beginning of the week and asked me if I wanted to pace our friend Tami to run a sub two half. How could I say no to that even though I wasn't feeling two confident about running at that pace? I decided to run it for fun and I threw on my Christmas colors and my new Pro Compression socks.

I stayed up until 2:30 am watching over my Grandpa and woke up at 6:30 am and had mixed feelings about running. I felt kind of selfish leaving to go run knowing that my Grandpa could die at any moment. My other half told me to go and run and that he would watch over Grandpa for me. I told him to call me if anything changed so I could head home if need be. This is a local race for me and is about 15 minutes away from my Grandma's house which was a good thing in case I need to leave. I was going to ride in with the girls that I was running with but told them to head on without me since I needed to drive my own car in case I needed to leave. The traffic was kind of crazy getting into the Pomona Fair Grounds but I arrived about 20 minutes early and found my friends within a few minutes.

I also ran into this wonderful lady who runs all of the local races and just happened to be running race number 16 of 2012! We talked for a little bit since the race started about ten minutes later than scheduled due to some kind of issue with the directions that were posted on their website. I think one of the streets that the participants were told to use, was closed. 

I told Caroline to have a great race and we were off. The plan was to take the first half easy and then pick it up in the second half. I told the girls that I would probably have to drop back in the second half since I was not !00% and didn't want to push myself too much. We stayed together for the first 7 miles of the race and then they went ahead of me. I could see them in front of me the entire time but just stayed back and ran a pressure free race. I kept checking my phone every few minutes to make sure that I did not miss any phone calls about my Grandpa. 

Tami finished in 1:55:03 and got her sub two half marathon! I am so happy for her! My other friend finished in 1:55:58 and I finished right behind her in 1:56:24.  

As soon as I finished, I congratulated Tami, took a few pictures, and then headed back to be with my Grandpa. He hung in there for me and waited for me to get back.

I really needed this run. I released a lot of stress and it also gave me some time away to think. The course is full of hills so it is not an easy one. The last two miles are flat and I was pretty darn happy to be done with the rolling hills.

I love the cute snow flake medal from this race. This will also be my very last race of 2012 which kind of makes me sad. I am pretty sure I will run this race again next year and continue to run it as my fun race of the year.