Hey guys happy Monday!
I'm going to get right to it since I have LOTS to talk about! Also, just a warning,this may get long and there will be lots of pics :)
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| packed the essentials...obviously |
As you know I spent my weekend in Fargo for the half marathon. We left Friday afternoon and picked up Emily on our way. With our car loaded up we made the 4 hour trip to Fargo.
We headed straight to the expo when we got there to pick up our packets and shirts and also meet up with some friends of Emily's who were also running the half/full marathon.
After the expo and meeting up with friends, we checked into our hotel and got ready to head to dinner. I made reservations for our group at an Italian place. I figured with a group of hungry runners, pasta and pizza would be the best choice. We hung out at the restaurant for a while then all headed back to our hotels to try and get some rest.
Our alarms went off at about 5:15 that morning, and we got up, had some breakfast (2 mini bagels and a banana for me), and made our way to the shuttle buses.
Since this year was the 10th anniversary of the marathon the route was different so we could end in downtown Fargo instead of the Fargo Dome like last year. This was pretty cool because we got to run right now the main street of downtown and it was absolutely packed with people.
Emily really wanted to get close to a 2 hour time, so we made a plan to start out at a 9:30 pace and work out way down from there. We started out and felt great. We were easily keeping a 9:15-9:20 pace for the first 8 miles, and the miles seemed to just fly by. I'll get to the detail of the race in my race review post, but again, crowd support was SO great, which helped the time go by really fast.
At about mile 8ish we met back up with Emily's friend Angela who joined us for the rest of the race. Ang and myself are pretty similar pace-wise, and knowing Jake and Em were running well together, we decided to pick up the pace. I was still feeling super comfortable and Ang was looking great so we gradually took the pace down to about 8:20's and kept speeding up from there. My legs felt great for the race. No shin or ankle issues at all, and it finally felt like a nice and easy long run. It helped that the weather was pretty perfect too. I ended up with a 1:56:30 (Garmin time), and Ang came in with a 1:58:xx. Em came in with Jake at about a 2:04:xx which is a 19 min. PR for her! For real, 19 minutes?! That's crazy-sauce and she did so awesome.
We hung around afterwards and waited for other peeps to finish, had some chocolate milk, stretched and layed in the grass - it was glorious.
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| on the car ride up! |
After the expo and meeting up with friends, we checked into our hotel and got ready to head to dinner. I made reservations for our group at an Italian place. I figured with a group of hungry runners, pasta and pizza would be the best choice. We hung out at the restaurant for a while then all headed back to our hotels to try and get some rest.
Our alarms went off at about 5:15 that morning, and we got up, had some breakfast (2 mini bagels and a banana for me), and made our way to the shuttle buses.
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| on the bus |
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| met up with some of the group before heading to the start |
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| on the bridge, ready to go! |
Emily really wanted to get close to a 2 hour time, so we made a plan to start out at a 9:30 pace and work out way down from there. We started out and felt great. We were easily keeping a 9:15-9:20 pace for the first 8 miles, and the miles seemed to just fly by. I'll get to the detail of the race in my race review post, but again, crowd support was SO great, which helped the time go by really fast.
At about mile 8ish we met back up with Emily's friend Angela who joined us for the rest of the race. Ang and myself are pretty similar pace-wise, and knowing Jake and Em were running well together, we decided to pick up the pace. I was still feeling super comfortable and Ang was looking great so we gradually took the pace down to about 8:20's and kept speeding up from there. My legs felt great for the race. No shin or ankle issues at all, and it finally felt like a nice and easy long run. It helped that the weather was pretty perfect too. I ended up with a 1:56:30 (Garmin time), and Ang came in with a 1:58:xx. Em came in with Jake at about a 2:04:xx which is a 19 min. PR for her! For real, 19 minutes?! That's crazy-sauce and she did so awesome.
We hung around afterwards and waited for other peeps to finish, had some chocolate milk, stretched and layed in the grass - it was glorious.
After hanging around for a while we made our slow hobble back to the hotel where we showered and decided a beer was in order.
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| and they were some mighty tall beers! |
We then made our way to find some food (none of us were super hungry right after the race), and we ended up at a great Mexican place - but lets be honest, after running 13.1 miles, no food and a huge beer, I'm pretty sure we would have eaten ANYTHING. We got back to the hotel and I'm confident we all PR'ed in lounging, complete with naps and doughnut-eating. After a few hours we rallied, cranked up the tunes and got ready to go out and meet the group. We ended up at a bar that had $1.50 beers...what?! Only in Fargo :) It was such a blast to just kick back and have fun for the rest of the night.
The next morning we got up, had some hotel breakfast and said cheers to a good weekend one more time before hitting the road.
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| nothing like champagne in a plastic cup |
Two years in a row of this being the best day ever?? I would say Fargo is slowing getting the reputation for having the best half marathon - but I'm just a little biased :)
I'll be back with a quick race review, and then it's the final push to MPLS. Just 3 more weeks! YIKES!
that sounds like such a fun weekend! congrats on a great race and for feeling amazing! I always love those races! and congrats to your friend for an AMAZING PR!!
ReplyDeleteThanks! Races are always more fun with friends :) If you get the chance to run Fargo sometime I say do it!
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