Hill Yeah!

I finished the Steamboat 15k on Saturday. My brother-in-law ran it too, while my mother-in-law ran the 4 mile race. I was pretty nervous about this one....after a week in Vegas and all of the bad things I was hearing about the hills....I wasn't sure if I would survive! But, I'm not sure what happened, but it just seemed to click. I felt great throughout the entire race. I didn't think the hills were bad at all...I was expecting it to be much worse. There are several factors that could have led to my race day success...1) I only ran twice during the week, allowing plenty of rest from running 2) I hydrated like crazy on Friday 3)I ate lots of pasta Thursday night and then had a bit more for lunch on Friday 4) my modified training plan during the weeks prior to the race (rotating a week of shorter distances, but more speed; followed by a week of longer distance with the same speed or slightly slower) 5) the 10 mile weekend route with the killer hills 6) increased protein intake throughout the month

I'm not sure what it was...maybe a combination of everything. I finished with a stopwatch time of 1:21:01. My pace was right around 8:48-8:50...I definitely felt like I could have kept going...so I'm looking forward to my next half marathon.

The post-race event was decent....I was really looking forward to the cold beer, but standing in line for 15-20 minutes with a hundred other stinky people made me question my desire for seconds. I was also ticked at all the non-runners that kept getting beer....seriously, they should do something about that. If you didn't run then you go to the other line...where you pay. Oh well, it was a great race and I'm glad it's over with. I did manage to see Mr and Mrs CJ at the end of the first loop...I hear they both did great!!

I've decided that I need to sign up for another half marathon before the AF half in September...I'm going to start looking for a good (and fairly inexpensive) race, so feel free to make suggestions.