Well that sucked.

Yep. There's just no other way to describe the 10k. I have vowed to never do that race again. It sucked all the confidence I had in my runs right the hell out of me. Just ask my lovely running partners, I cussed a lot during it and I still want to cuss when I think about it. It was hard. Ever since the race, I've been questioning whether I can REALLY do a half-marathon. Not a good feeling at all.

The problem is that it started at 8:00 so by then it was probably already 80 degrees. AND my goodness.. do they HAVE to include THAT many hills? Really? I'm kind of angry that people told me just how hilly and hard the course was before the race because I thought about the hills that were to come the ENTIRE run. So, I'd get moving and then the assvice of "save your energy for xx hill" that someone gave me would creep in and my body and mind would refuse to go another inch.

Grr..

I guess the good thing is that we finished and we survived. My time was 1:09 so an 11.10 mile. Again, not great, but whatever.

I felt like I had shin splints on Friday and iced them on Friday night but they were fine on Saturday. Shew! I think I dodged a bullet or something there. I didn't have any shin pain (er, none out of the ordinary) during the race.

Another reason I love my runnin' girls? I was a little ahead of my two partners at the very beginning of the race. I was running with someone I know but had NEVER run with before. Just before the 1mile mark, I hear "Emily! Emily!" and I turn around and my girls, pretty much at the same time, said "We are doing a 9-minute mile right now!!!" Obviously we all knew we'd NEVER survive 6.2 miles going 9-minute miles so we all slowed each other down. When we hit the 1 mile mark we were right at 10 minutes so that was perfect.

So, my time wasn't the best but I'm glad I had friends there to lean on and talk me out of some of the funk I had in my head.

Here's a couple pictures I stole from Jules' facebook page. I'm feeling WAY too lazy to download the ones on my camera! (I totally look preggers in all the pictures! I need to work on my posture.)

Me and Jules before the race:
Liz (our coach!), Maria, Jules and me. The three of us started this running thing last year when we trained for the July 4th 5k.
Me and KT before the race. He did the 2-miler in something crazy like 18 minutes?! He's seriously the best cheerleader ever. And I loved his green shirt because I could see him from way far away!

Me and Susan at the finish. We both picked up our speed at the finish but she TOOK OFF!! Go girl!
All the Janes at the end! We did it!

Hills

I used to say "I love hills!" and I really meant it. I am not a fan of flat running for long periods of time. I do like the change of pace (literally) that hills provide.

During this training program, I've sort of just hated hills all around. Well, last night, we met with some crazy ultrarunner to do hill repeats. We ran a 1-mile warm up and then went up a humoungous hill (I can't even explain how far the hill goes. Just trust me on this one.) 4 times after doing intervals of 10 seconds, 20, 30 and 40. It totalled 1.5 miles! ON A HILL! We did NOT get much rest time between the repeats. After the hard hills in 90 degrees, we went another mile or so to "cool down".

I haven't done that hard of a workout in a LONG time. I'd rather go run 6 miles on a Saturday morning than go up that crazy hill just one time. I know that it helps me in the long run but SHEESH!

Mama was TIRED when she got home. I sat on the couch and let hubby bring me dinner. And then went to bed at 9:15 just to get up at 5:45 to run again.

Yes, run again at 5:45.

This time we only did 2 miles since we are in preparation for the 10k on Saturday. And because we technically did our Thursday run on Wednesday since we got in about 3.7 miles. I just couldn't not run this morning. I love days when I've run in the morning.

So, we did a quick 2.2.. and there were several ladies who SAID they were going to just do 2 but they didn't, they just kept going! YOU GO GIRLS!!

I was hurting during the way back on the 2.2 run so I walked some but finally got in my groove at the end.

Tomorrow, it's rest day so that I can be ready for the 10k on Saturday. I have a goal time in my head but I'm not posting it here for fear of humiliation. ;)