the jennadventures: may [half] marathon madness!

so can you believe that my first ever half marathon is exactly ONE month away from tomorrow?! (so clearly i started writing this last week but am a S L A C K E R). ahhhhhhhhhh! i'm so excited and scared. it's going to be such an amazing experience! i've been super focused on my training and i can definitely say it paid off when i ran my first ever 10k this past saturday...

so i can proudly say that when someone asks me to run 6 miles, i dont get scared. i just say "hmm ok sounds good" because that's a comfortable distance for me now. so when it was time to run my 10k i thought, that should be a breeze. my goal was under an hour. i can do that in a heartbeat. until i realized that there were crazy insane hills on this course. and i started to ~~freak out!~~ everyone was like "oh you got this don't worry" but of course, i doubted myself a teeeeny tiiinnnyy bit. so what was my plan of attack?? a clear head. no distractions. a perfect carb up friday night. the perfect most comfortable outfit. the perfect iPod mix of music. the perfect pre-race meal timing and carb/energy concoction. the perfect #1 fans in presence. and luckily, some perfect running weather.

so we arrive. i'm warming up, myrtling if you may. i'm starting to get super excited. adrenaline is beginning to start really flowing. so we walk over to the starting line. and i tell my family that i'm going to push up front a little more because i haaaaate starting in the back. finally we start. i wanted a slow pace in the beginning so that i wouldnt be pooped out. the good thing about the race is that it was two laps of the 5k so i figured i'd do the 5k and then i'd know how much energy i had left to push through to the end. well boy oh boy were there some crazy hills on this course. but to my pleasure, I LOVE RUNNING HILLS! it's a sick, sick disease. i see a hill and i get sprung. haha i get SO excited. i'm at the bottom and i tell myself "i am SO about to handle this hill" and that, my friends, is exactly what i did. i haaannnddllleed those hills. my glutes are definitely paying for it today. but can i just say, i had the BEST time running that 10k. i was just running. and it was so much fun. i felt so free and so proud of myself. i did the first 3 miles, checked my time on my sportsband and was like i have enough in me to finish in under an hour. so i went on and passed people the entire second half of the race. i passed people up hills, i passed people down hills, and even on the flat course. i then conquered the final hill and with one mile to go, i ~~sprinted~~. mind you, sprinting after you've just run a crazy, hilly, 5 mile course is a lot slower than usual. BUT, i pushed it. and when i came around to that finish line i pushed alll the way through. and got to run through the finish line with my mom cheering me on right there. :) it was the best experience a girl could ask for on her first 10k. it makes me smile thinking about it. and now i cannot wait for my half marathon.

so what happens now?? i'm a month out.. i'm just following my nike training schedule perfectly and that means 9 miles on wednesday!! tomorrow, i'll share my current training schedule with y'all.

happy monday!