The Ogden 1/2 Marathon

Yesterday was the Ogden Half Marathon!

My day started out waking up at 2:45 am! (Actually Crew crawled in bed with us at 2, so I really didn't sleep much after that.) I left my house by 3 am. I drove to Ogden, which I planned would take an hour and a half, and then a little extra for finding a place to park. I needed to load the bus between 4:45 and 5. I ended up getting up to Ogden and sitting in my car from 4:20 till 4:45. Then loaded the bus and headed up the canyon. We were dropped off around 5:15, and then waited until the race started at 7 am. It was a little cold waiting, but I had on my sweats and a jacket and there were fire barrels to keep us warm.

I read something once about starting at the back so that you would pass people and be more motivated than if you were getting passed the whole time, so that's what I did. We had timer chips too, so I figured it didn't really start for me until I crossed over the starting line. SO, I actually waited a few minutes until people started to get through. There were SO many people! I think the limit was 2000 and it got sold out. There was also a full marathon, a marathon relay, a 5k, and a kidsk, so there were tons of people up there!

Anyway, I started later, but was able to start weaving in between people and got a pretty good start, a little slow, but still good for so many people! In fact, the first mile was my slowest, at 8:53 min/mile. A lot of people told me that the hardest thing was to not start out too fast, and it really was hard. I figured I wanted to be at a 9 min/mile pace, and then have positive splits the whole time, but obviously I didn't stay there. I averaged an 8:18 pace and felt really good the whole race. It was a great course, mostly downhill, but not too steep. I really loved the whole thing. I am not sure why I didn't get involved in this sooner. Up until now, the furthest race I'd done was a 10k.

So, I ended up finishing with a time of 1:49:32. My goal was to come in around 2 hours, and I was amazed that I was able to beat that by almost 11 minutes! YAY! When I registered for the race, I registered with the "Athena" division, which is basically the heavy weights. And I was heavier when I registered in January, I'm not really in that weight category now, but it helped my placing! I placed 5th in my division! I was 25th out of all the women in my age division. I know I'll never win one of these races, but I am really pleased with my time and I felt really good afterwards! My mother-in-law even commented on how terrible some of the people looked afterwards. Rett, my mother-in-law, and the boys were there at the finish line! Thanks so much for supporting me! I love you guys!






Running wise, I'm in really good spirits right now. The race gave me a huge confidence boost. And I registered myself for the Deseret News Marathon in July! So, it's continuing my marathon training program! And my next event will be the Wasatch Back Relay in June! What's wrong with me? I really do love running!