Shamrock'n Half Marathon

Last Sunday Lauren and I ran our second half marathon! Wahoo!!!

My one resolution for this year was to run at least one mile a day, everyday. January was great. I felt so pumped at the beginning that I even registered to run a half marathon in March. However, my running high didn't last long. The last week of January I had the stomach flu (eww), which prevented me from running for a few days. There was no way I could run; I felt horrible. But once I did start feeling better, going to the gym everyday wasn't a priority anymore. Thus, I hadn't run since like January 28. I kept telling myself that I would start running again to train for my half marathon, but I never did. I even started the year off following a 12-week training program...

Despite my lack of thorough conditioning, this half marathon was so much easier and felt much better than the one I ran in July. When I ran that half marathon, I ran a total of maybe 5 times that entire year, haha! So even though I only ran for less than a month leading up to the Shamrock'n half marathon, it was a lot more training than I had put in before.

 Before:

 After:

Okay, so I fell. I was literally 20 feet (if that) from crossing the finish line when I fainted. I was running at full speed (as fast as my legs could carry me after 13 miles), and I ended up on my knees.

Regardless of my graceful fall, I managed to beat my previous half marathon time by about 28 minutes, and I reached my goal of finishing under 3 hours! All's well that ends well?

Sooooo...I've already registered to run a 10 mile race in April and my third half marathon in May. My left knee is still too sore to run, but hopefully I'll be able to start training again by Tuesday. Fingers crossed!