My first and last half marathon?

We all left from Robb and Jill's ranch after we dropped off the poochies. Before that, I woke up at 5 a.m. to finish my grades to post to the district's grading program my urchin's academic efforts (at least for people who have a password). It all started after Karen and Robb ran 'The Other Half" half-marathon back in October; and one day, when we were all sitting around during Christmas break, somebody in the group suggested we do the first half, half-marathon come Spring. Me being rather susceptible to peer pressure said, "Ah, what the heck." as did my brother in-law. So. Six hours later and after stopping by The Hot Tomato in Fruita for an early din-din, here we are in Moab.

 If you look at the numbers, we had the opportunity to put a personalized message on it. Mine was "Fly or Die," Karen's was "runforpeace;" Drew's: Dopers suck; and Robb's: the number for Jean Valjean when he was in the French pokie. Got in just in time to get our packet pickup and to sample the free goodies from Clif Bar, who happens to be our cycling team's sponsor as well. Coincidentally it happened to be my brother in-law's birthday so we had a we bit of birthday cake i brought from Cake Crumbs back in Denver. Drew snapped the plastic knife from the motel 8 and needless to say it was a messy yet rather delicious snack before bedtime.

starting to pile up.

'Tis go day. We're up and at 'em and here's what the start line looks like. The start time's at 10 and we're up there by 8:30, so we relax. Once we're off, we're hoofing it pretty good. Karen, Drew, and I have to pee rather fierce so we find a porta potty with a rather long queue and wait it out. Robb's not feeling good this morning so he keeps running and we'll catch up with him later. Later comes, and around mile 9 my IT band is absolutely SCREAMING and I tell Karen I have to walk because I am in pain. So this is how I finish: I walk a bunch and run in twenty second intervals until I finally cross the finish line. I'm motivated by the pace setter carrying the 2:30 sign. What a great motivator. I'm the slowest in my group with a 2:30h. Karen finishes with a 2:12; Robb, a 2:13, and Drew a 2:10. After looking at my Garmin my last 3 miles were 14 minutes a piece. Ouch! Not done with half marathoning. Want to do it free of pain next time as evidenced by my gimpiness as we walk back to our hotel.

We end our hunger at Giliberto's, formerly Los Jilbertos for a mostly empty but delicious refill of kilocalories. It was actually fun...we'll see if another opportunity arises.