Fly with the Eagles Half / Long Run

I had the best 18 mile run ever on Saturday. It had been 3 years since I've run 18 miles, but I've committed to the Illinois Marathon, so I had to get out there. Barbie and I had registered for the Fly with the Eagles Half Marathon on Saturday, with the understanding that we would each get our extra miles beforehand.

In order to make this easier, we stayed over at her son's house on Friday evening, which was closer to the start of the Half. There, we got the long run preparations underway early:

Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time!! We wound up drinking one bottle of wine and then a martini after dinner, not too bad.

The next morning, we got to the race an hour and a half early, no small feat for us. We're usually the ones who come squealing in 10 minutes before the start. The race started at a visitor center for the wildlife refuge. The door was still locked when we got there. Registration was supposed to start at 7am. So, there we were, waiting for somebody to come and unlock the door (we desperately needed a restroom before starting to run). Luckily, the race director got our race numbers and sweatshirts (very nice sweatshirts for this race) out of his trunk so we wouldn't have to deal with that later.

We wound up driving up the road to a gas station to use the restroom, then came back and started running. I had to get 5 miles prior to the race, and Barbie had to run 7. I think they waited for Barbie to start the race, since we got such a late start. We didn't start running until 50-55 minutes before the scheduled start of the race.

Here we are between our pre-race miles and the start of the race, along with a couple of other friends:

My early miles went great, I had a hard time keeping it slow enough. I have developed a blister on my big toe (this is a first), so Carol helped me get it sorted out before the start of the Half Marathon. My Half Marathon went surprisingly well also. I felt fantastic the entire time. I even picked off some runners in my last mile! Mile 17 of my long run, and I'm passing people. Amazing.

I did slow down for 2-3 miles. I met a runner before the race who was fairly new to running and was talking about my training run that day. As I was passing her around mile 7, she asked me to stay with her for a while and chat. I gladly slowed my pace to do that. There were only about 100-150 runners in this race, so it wasn't like there were people around the entire time. We had just come out of the wildlife sanctuary, which for some reason was BRUTAL for this race, it's usually my favorite part.

Eventually, she needed to slow down, and I wanted to get going, so I broke away from her around the 10 mile mark.

My overall pace for the 18 miles was 11:25. I think I could have kept it under 11 min/mile if I would have pushed a bit more. The run was extremely easy for me. My Half Marathon time was 2:31.

I felt so great the next day, I think I could have ran. I didn't, but I did go shopping with the kids all Sunday afternoon. My plan was to run this morning, but I woke up with some stomach issues. I haven't been able to keep anything in my stomach all day. UGH! Hopefully, I feel better by morning, I need to get running!