This week marked an official two months into marathon training!

This week was a little different than the 7 weeks before though... Jeremy and I knew going into this week that we were going to be running our 5th half marathon on Saturday. Maintaining a normal running schedule, on Tuesday we ran our 4 miles at an average pace. Our Thursday miles are now starting to rev up and we had to run 6 miles, something we had never done two days before running a half marathon. We ran our 6 in about 53 minutes and overall felt really good. This week we decided to rest on Friday instead of cross training. This was the most miles either one of us had ever put in in one week, so resting for one day wasn't going to kill us!

Saturday's forecast was calling for cold rain around race time. This was nothing new for Jeremy and I, since almost every half we've ran there has been rain either during the run, or immediately after. It was going to be 13.1 rain or shine! While we had no expectations for a certain time on the run, there is still something about participating in an actual organized run that gets your heart pounding, your adrenaline flowing, the butterflies in your stomach fluttering. I still had all those feelings walking up to the start line, but still saying in the back of my mind that I was going to have to run 13 miles anyways, so just have fun and run your best.

I thought this course was challenging, but overall pretty fast. It took us through a very scenic part of Kansas City through Ward Parkway. The race was extremely organized and was very accessible for parking! The rain held off until we were walking up to the start line, and about 7:30 we started to feel sprinkles. By mile 3 or so, it was coming down pretty good, but to me, I could hardly feel the rain. I was feeling really great and strong during the run! I really didn't start to feel the wetness until about mile 10. My shoes and socks were feeling really wet and squishy. With only a 5k left, and looking down at my Garmin watch seeing the fastest times for our mileage, I knew it was going to be a great finish regardless. My husband, Benny and children were not going to be able to make it to this run because of my son's scheduled soccer game that morning, which was eventually canceled due to rain. My parents and my sister and niece were supposed to be at the finish line waiting for me to cross, and by knowing that, it kept me going fast and strong. This was the first half marathon my parents and sister had seen me finish in, so I was extremely excited anticipating seeing them at the finish.

Jeremy and I both ended up finishing with our PR's- my Garmin watch clocked our finish time @ 1:49:30 @ 13.1, but both of our chip times clocked us at 1:50:04. I took 31 out of 189 for my 24-29 female age group. I had improved my half marathon time by over 10 minutes. The best feeling besides finishing with an awesome time and seeing my family waiting for me at the finish, was that I felt we finished really strong and much different than the other 4 halves we had ran before. I felt that we could have ran a lot longer and I think that was the biggest test for me. Knowing that in 2 1/2 months we would only be half way done at this point has made me even more confident that we will do great in San Diego! Only 10 more weeks!