san antonio rock 'n' roll half marathon

 we ran our first half marathon today!!! yesterday we went to the expo center and shopped 'til we nearly dropped/until i had to go to work.

 i impulse purchased these tattoos that help you monitor your pace and i loveeddddd mine even though i continued to be off another minute each passing mile, haha. my expectations for my time were a teeeeeny bit unrealistic. jon put his on upside down and i got a good laugh but he definitely didn't. it actually didn't matter because we tried going to bed last night and jon said "it feels like there are 1,000 ants on my tattoo". turns out he was having an allergic reaction!:

we signed up for the race in april and started training pretty seriously in july. the first few months of training, we ran first thing in the morning. we signed up for a second half marathon on dec. 7th that is a night run so we decided that we should probably try to run in the afternoons and that ended up working better for our schedule anyway. i think that hurt me during the half today. i have been so used to eating and hydrating all day before the run that while i was running today i was soooo thirsty and starving even though i thought i had planned pretty well the days leading up to it.

jon and i parted ways about .01 miles into the race and it started out okay for me even though i knew i had picked the wrong tattoo very early on.

my first layer of KT tape wore off at mile 2 and my right leg KT tape wore off at mile 6. When i got halfway, i was already pep-talking myself. i couldn't believe how much more difficult this was compared to our 9, 10, and 11 mile runs that we did at home in the afternoon. i was soooo thirsty but the more i drank, the weirder it felt on my stomach. luckily i packed four power bar energy blasts (with no caffeine) and they helped a lot. the longest i've ever run is 11 miles so when i passed that mile marker i was pretty proud of myself! i was definitely counting down the minutes and miles at this point and was really trying not to walk. at 12 miles i started taking walking breaks. my breaths were so shallow that i got a painful side ache and starting walking soon before the finish line. an angel sent straight from heaven pushed on my shoulder and said "c'mon baby girl." i groaned but started running and crossed the finish line at a run. i don't think i could have pushed myself, she's just what i needed and i made sure to thank her afterwards.

jon was waiting for me at the finish line looking wayyyy better than i felt! he finished in 2:22! I am so proud of him! my legs and feet actually held up pretty well. my biggest problem was my lower back (which started hurting pretty bad at mile 11) and my hunger/thirst. i couldn't stand up for very long after i finished and had to lay down for quite awhile before i got the courage to make the trek to the shuttles to take us 15 minutes back to the car and then drive 35 minutes home, ughhh. the drive home was unpleasant and i truly thought i was going to throw up. i felt better as soon as i showered and took a bath. i've been a bit queazy today but i'm not as sore as i expected (tomorrow should be fun).

i finished in 2:46 and am pretty proud! we have another half in three weeks and we are both excited and not excited. my goal is to finish that one in 2:45 and jon's goal is 2:20. the best part about our upcoming race is that it is at the brand new JW Marriott just up the street from us. they're nightly rates are usually $250 and up, but they offered us a ridiculous deal the night of the race! it is a night run through their property decorated with christmas lights and after the race we can go straight up into our luxury hotel room. 

we are so proud of ourselves for finishing today! it took a lotttt of time and dedication to get us to this point that we never thought we would be at. it was awesome to be among 25,000 people who were all making themselves proud and succeeding in such a difficult thing (especially the full marathoners).