ENDURrun Stage 1: The Half Marathon

6:15 am
The alarm woke me up and I could hear and smell coffee brewing in the kitchen. I decided to stay in bed for a few more minutes and was up by 6:22 am.

6:30 am 
Sitting in the living room eating breakfast (toasted English muffin with peanut butter and banana and my cup of coffee) and reading updates and comments of other runners all getting ready to start the ENDURrun today. Looking outside, it’s quite wet out there, but as long as it’s not pouring, it should be just fine.

7:00 am
I’m all ready, dressed, body-glided, and excited to get to the start line. Race start is in 1 hour. Just waiting for Ryan (http://shootthethrill.ca) to get out of the shower so we can go.

Okay.. it’s now early afternoon. I’m home, I’m clean, and I’m ready to finish this post my thoughts and some BB photos.

The half marathon started at 8:00 am just about the same time as the rain. It was a light rain, so not too bad at all, but I’m sure the volunteers and spectators weren’t too happy with it.  For the majority of the run it was humid and damp, but not actually raining. It did, however, rain more after I was finished.

I finished stage 1 in a time of 1:52:39 (according to my Garmin, I didn’t catch what my official time was and it’s not up on the website yet). This time was actually a PB for me in a half marathon event. I ran the first half of the Mississauga Marathon in just over a minute faster, but as far as running the specific half distance, this is my best time yet!

(Now feels like a good time to share my post-race sweaty BlackBerry self-portrait)

I really enjoyed this stage today. At one point I wished I had a camera on me because I looked toward the Grand River and saw a man standing in the middle, fishing, with the mist surrounding him. With no camera on me, I had to take a mental picture. Perhaps I’ll just head out there one morning to see if this is a common occurrence.

Okay.. back to the event. I kept a decent pace today and I felt really good, too. I don’t feel like I overdid it, so I should (hopefully) have lots of gas left in the tank for the rest of the week.

6 more stages to go and I’ll be One Tough Runner.

Congrats to everyone else who completed stage 1 today. I’ll see you tomorrow at the 15K time trial!

   

Above photos: Top: Ryan McGovern, Middle Left: Paul Mora, Middle Right: Dave Rutherford, bottom: Catherine Kelly.