Rock 'n Roll Anniversary

Since the birth of baby Sanders no. 2, I managed to get back into exercising (and back into my jeans) fairly early. (I'm sorry for those of you that have to workworkwork to lose the baby weight. I really am. I think I just have genetics and breastfeeding side effects on my side. It honestly didn't have much to do with the running. Sorry!) My husband had fallen out of regular exercise, and this summer, he decided that he needed motivation to get back to it. Motivation in the form of paying $100 to run a half-marathon some few months down the road. I usually run one once every two years or so, and I was due, so we started researching races together. We landed on the Rock 'n Roll Half-Marathon in STL, which neither of us had done before, and it happened to fall on the weekend before our anniversary. It was meant to be!

Some eight years ago when I was finishing law school, Steve was finishing grad school, and we were planning a wedding, we decided to run a half-marathon together as a way to jump start our plan to get in great shape before the wedding. I'll give you the short version of how that went down: running comes easily to Steve, I have to slog through every mile, I forgot my Ipod in the car, neither of us had a Garmin-like device to determine pace, and we were both sore for days following because it was our first half and WE JUST DIDN'T KNOW WHAT WE WERE DOING. We both swore that we would never run one together, if at all, again.

Well...like the amnesia that women develop surrounding their childbirth experiences, we forgot all about our previous complaints and dove headfirst into training. The first six weeks or so were great. Then, Steve contracted some mysterious virus that sidelined him for two weeks. Then on Labor Day weekend, I sprained my ankle and stayed off of it for two weeks. And in the month leading up to the race, our entire household came down with sinus infections, bronchitis, ear infections, and more, so interval training (yeah right) and speed work went by the wayside, and it was all we could do to get it together for our long runs on Saturdays.

Despite the setbacks, we were hopeful going into that COLD October morning. No body parts were hurting (yet), we timed it perfectly to hit the port-a-potties with about five minutes to start time, and I had my Ipod securely in hand and my trusty Garmin on my wrist.

Look at us: cold but confident!

We waited about ten minutes after the gun went off until our corral was released. Miles 1-3 can best be described in the words of my husbands as 'running like chickens with our heads cut off.' Basically, there were too many people who were in the WRONG CORRAL (don't get me started on that one) and my nerves caused me to run an 8:30-9 minute pace when our goal was to stick around 10. Once the 10K'ers turned off the course, things quieted down and we thought we had it made. WRONG. Then we encountered the first of several loooooooong sloooooooow hills, while staring directly into the surface of the sun (without sunglasses, because Hey, it was dark when we started!). At mile 6 I had a hot flash and needed to get my outer layer off fast, which involved me accidentally ripping out all four safety pins of my race bib (oops). We recovered and moved on. Miles 7-10 were fine. I wouldn't say they flew by, but our pace slowed and there was plenty of water.

After mile 10, my mind said, 'hey, you are less than half an hour away from being done with this thing. So MOVE IT and be done already.' And my body said, 'let's play a game where we take turns pinching and cramping various joints and body parts to make sure they still feel pain.' The highlight of the entire race might have been at mile 12 when Steve was trying to signal me to slow down (headphones were blaring), and I screamed at him, 'I do not want to hold your hand right now!' Good to know we still have the magic 7 years in.

We were SO HAPPY to be done at the finish line, and I had no clue how we finished at the time, because downtown STL was just too much for my trusty Garmin and we lost reception. We learned later that we came in about half a minute under our goal time, so that was okay. Post-race we also stumbled upon free stretches from licensed athletic trainers (nice) and enjoyed a nice cold sip of our complimentary Michelob Ultra (no thanks). Would we do it again? Steve says no. I say 'it's too soon,' which means probably in another two years.

I'll leave you with some of my favorite inspirational signs held up by cheering fans during the race:
-Who's idea was this?
-You paid $$$ for this?

-Hurry, your student loans are catching up to you!

-Chafed nipples turn me on!

Notice how red my face is, and how not-red my husband's is...grr.

Cheers!