Early in the school year, when I was setting my race schedule, I registered for a half marathon in May. I registered so early I think that is the reason why my race number was #26. All year I looked forward to the warm race at the end of the season. I arrived early on race day to a beautiful sunrise and country side to run along.
One of the aspects of the race I will always remember was how beautiful the countryside was to run through. I will also remember, however, the wind, the lower than expected temperature(45), and the cold that I was in bed with the day before and am still feeling the effects of a week later. The race is advertised to be “predominantly without hills”, which I expected no hills. I found, however, low rolling hills, which did not affect me in the end due to the training on hills here at Fort Leavenworth. If I were to run this course again, I would have trained with more hills to compensate. My speed, however, was more affected by the wind.
I will mostly remember that through all of that hardship I was still able to record my fastest time since 2012 and nearly broke back under the two-hour mark. I applied my lessons learned from the previous race, particularly when I left the water point, where I concentrated on getting back up to pace after walking. I was also motivated by the 2:00 Pace Runner who continually encouraged and coached those around her to make it to the end with her. With the challenges that I experienced with breathing and against the wind, I was very encouraged that my time was as low as it was.
At the end of the race, I was able to have my photo with the cow as the character walked around the food area. The organizers set up a well-stocked food area for the runners and it was a great place to get out of the wind and cold to cool down from the run. The race day turned out to be a lot of fun to experience and, if was able, would love to try it again next year.