Go for It

Back from Sacramento and ready to report on my time there.  The whole weekend was filled with fun, fun, fun.  I made dinner and cookies, helped with all the decorating for Amanda's baby shower, picked up my race packet, and grabbed a hearty dinner, ran my personal best 1/2 marathon, showered it up, worshipped at Arcade Church, and helped paint the baby's room.  Told ya it was fun!  Here's the breakdown from the race.

Friday we headed over to Fleet Feet to pick up our race packets and Hammer Gel to make sure we had everything for the race.

Then it was time for dinna!  Amanda and Jasen took me to one of their favorite places, which also happened to be part of their 3 year tradition for loading up for this race.

HOT ITALIAN!

 We ordered:

46 Gattuso
pumpkin puree, smoked mozzarella, fresh parsley, sage oil

&

11 Ligabue
basil pesto, mozzarella, pine nuts, pecorino romano cheese 

It was delicious!

We headed home and made sure to get to bed early so we'd be fully rested for our big day.  I woke up the next morning excited and feeling good.  Got all ready...

And put my game face on...

We headed out the door, and braced ourselves for the chilly walk we had before us.  After the nearly two mile walk (yes we had to walk back afterwards too) we made it to our destination.  Took a quick stop in the porta potties, and found our place in line.

We then waited through all of the opening stuff...which included a processional of bagpipers!

The gun went off, and we made our way to the starting line with the big crowd.  Then we hit the ground running!

Oh yeah...and if you missed it, Amanda is 7 months pregnant!  I know right!?  She's my hero!

It was a beautiful trail and I felt so good the whole time.  Had to take a quick potty break at mile 5 but I pushed hard to catch up with everyone. 

Since the road was not really wide I found myself running with crowds the whole way.  Which I loved.  I think it made the race seem smaller though there were 3000 people, and I felt a real sense of camaraderie.  I didn't even listen to music until the last 3 miles.  Here's some official pics of me from the race.

Just starting out and feeling good!

I made sure to smile every time I saw the camera.  And when I saw the finish line...I sprinted to the end!

It was an emotional time again.  I still can't believe sometimes that I'm running 1/2 marathons.  It's the best feeling!

My second medal!  And Jasen's along with his battle wounds!

We made our way back to the house at a leisurely pace and stopped for a quick photo op along the way.

So glad for the opportunity to run this race with my very special friends.  It was an awesome experience. And I'm ready for more!  So what was my official time??

Which is a whole 5 minutes and 19 seconds faster than my last time!

I finished 126 out of 226 women in my age group (25-29).  

And 1369 out of 3307 people overall.

And P.S. Amanda was only 3 minutes behind me!!  I told you she was a rockstar!