The Parkway Half.

On Saturday I ran the American River Parkway Half Marathon. It was a beautiful day for some intense exercise! Tim and The Littles came to see me start and finish, it felt so good to be cheered for by them. Before the race I ran into my friend Merry from up the street and her neighbor who run this race every year, so fun to see them out of our regular routine and meeting up sort of randomly because of our mutual enjoyment of running. Camino was well represented. The course trail was lovely meandering along the quiet river and at every mile marker there was a musical group playing songs to entertain the runners. My favorite group was the bagpipers! The race organizers also posted inspirational quotes along the trail to motivate the participants, I relied heavily on these little quotes with each growing mile. I was feeling good throughout until mile 11 when we had long stretches of blazing sun on our faces and shoulders, the day was heating up and I had hit a wall. It's amazing how much of a mental game long distance running really is. Those last 2 miles were rough. Also I feel like I started out a little faster than I should and so while my goal was to run the whole race without stopping, and I did, I was also wanting to finish in under 2 hours which I did not. My time was 2:05:57.

 

Tara and her littles came to see me finish, Tara was a big supporter of me in my training. As a veteran racer she gave me invaluable advice and also ran with me on my longest run (as well as other runs) leading up to this race. Thank you for encouraging and supporting me Tara!