AFC Half Marathon Recap

I had been looking forward to this race for months! Not only was it my 2nd half marathon ever, it was in the cool and beach-y town on San Diego...one of my favorite places.

Having trained in Phoenix ALL.SUMMER.LONG I was confident that I was well conditioned and prepared. The nervousness I felt at my first half was gone and it was replaced with excitement and a goal to speed up my time, and not JUST cross the finish line. Now as I mentioned before, I was also happy I didn't crap my pants, barf or pass out. Goal achieved.

We left for SD earlier than planned as the beach house we were renting was available a night earlier, so we left Phoenix about 7:30 Friday night and rolled into town at about 1:30 am. This left us with a WHOLE extra day of vacation and the chance to get to Expo without stressing about the annoying ass traffic or where to put the dogs if we weren't able to drop them off at the beach house first.

We slept in, had a late breakfast....

Carbo Loading at it's finest

And then we headed to the Expo. It sucked. I'm sorry San Diego, but your traffic on a Saturday afternoon is fricking STUPID. And who puts an Expo right next to the airport? With one way in, and one way out? I was super irritated on the drive there.

I am NOT impressed San Diego

And then I got there, and I was happy. But then the Expo turned out to be pretty bonerific. They only had a handful of vendors and weren't giving out any free swag. Lame. Whatevs.

Yessssss

We layed low the rest of Saturday and hit Trader Joe's so we could cook dinner at the Beach House...

Hey, where's the pasta?

We hit the sack early (I had a glorious night's sleep in the guest bedroom...Wade + Lindsay + Queen Bed = Hell...I know, romantical right? We woke up at the ass crack of dawn (this is fun, right?) 3:45 so we could drive to Balboa Park and get on a bus to be chauffeured out to the start. Cars were not allowed at the start and one of the freeway's was closed (again, those Ass-hats in San Diego) so we arrived super early and had plenty on time to sit between two GIANT rows of port-a-potty's. So gross. We kept ourselves entertained by people watching....runner's are certainly an "eclectic" group.

Sure hope Officer Dangle used his Glide today!

The race started on time, the weather was PERFECTION, and the majority of the course was scenic, well laid out and had good footing. A few parts around the airport were full of potholes and had some pretty nasty crowning. I kind of expected this being in such a large, traffic filled city. There was plenty of water and watered down Gatorade that tasted just like water, blech! The first part was downhill and I gained some speed and time on that. 

Psh, I was like totally right behind him.

I took my Shot Blox around mile 7 (I think) and kept on going, on pace...and then the last 2 miles sucked ass and were uphill through downtown SD and into Balboa part. I was pretty tired the last couple miles. I got my medal, took a stupid looking picture and went to look for Wade and Kara.

Awkward, Table of 1

My goal was to finish in 2:05, 15 minutes off my first half. I came in at 2:05:39. I was a LITTLE disappointed that it wasn't a teeny bit better, but considering that lame ass hill at the end that slowed me down, I'll take it. This little Phoenix Pixie ain't used to all those hills. Note to self, more hill training. I felt kind of nauseous after I got done. I think it was the humidity. I didn't feel hot the entire run (hello training in 90 degrees for the past 2 months) but I was realllllly sweaty and smelly when I got done. Cute huh?

Kara, me and Wadester

My awesome hubby KILLED it. He amazes me. He finished in 1:43:43 and felt great the WHOLE time. I am a very proud wife. And Kara, she's of course, awesome and pretty bad-ass....she did really great as well. And her cute little boy Dom, and her hubby TJ were waiting at the end for us. Anddddd, we had a lot of fun. We celebrated with beer for lunch and wine and pasta for dinner. 

Dinner with our Favorite Neighbors!

Ok, end of story.