Chicago Rock n Roll Half Marathon

This past weekend we road tripped to Chicago so I could run in the Chicago Rock n Roll half marathon. I could have trained a lot harder and better for this race than I did. While it was a priority, spending time with Ben and Tabitha and sleep often trumped it. Never the less I was feeling pretty confident about running my goal time of 1 hour and 52 minutes...pretty much an 8:30 min mile. It was my goal because 1 hour and 52 minutes would get me a priority start in the USAF half marathon coming up in September.

Saturday we woke up like we did on a normal weekday. Took some 30 week pictures,
and hit the road. It was supposed to take 5 hours or so to get there...it took us over 7 hours. OK, so we did have to stop for gas and to eat lunch, but still. Tabitha would be hungry, we'd feed her, then 20 or so minutes later she would be hungry again. Silly girl. Here she is wishing she could ride in the front seat the whole way.

She did get a lot of nap time, which made us a little nervous, but she slept like a champ.

I had to stop by the race expo to pick up my race packet, and after that we had hoped to go to the Chicago Field museum, but because Bon Jovi was playing at Soldier Field and the parking lot was the same for both venues, it was $46 to park and we certainly weren't going to do that, so we headed for our hotel. Once we checked in we played with Tabitha a little and then went walking around downtown Chicago near Grant Park and Buckingham Fountain. There were a ton of wedding parties there taking pictures.Lake Michigan. We had some pasta and then went to bed. Tabitha slept great. Ben and I, on the other hand, didn't sleep so well. It was an older hotel so we could hear everything that went on outside including fireworks and a pretty intense fight.

Sunday morning we got up around our normal weekday time, I fed Tabitha, pumped and then went to find the starting line. Tabitha and Ben met me out there a little later. When I turned my GPS watch on, it told me the battery is low, which is bad for a 13.1 mile run. Yep, it died before I even really got a satellite signal. I found my corral, corral 13, and waited for the race to begin. We were grouped according to our predicted finish time. I predicted 2 hours, hoping to finish faster...and I should have said the faster time. The whole race I was dodging people. Here I am at the very beginning.

I was at the front of my pack for the start.There were bands all along the way, which was pretty cool. My first 10 miles were pretty good. Since I didn't have a watch, I was constantly doing the math as to what time I needed at the mile markers to keep an 8:30 pace. I had it up until mile 12, but unfortunately the rest of it was uphill and I didn't push it enough to get my 1:52 time. 1:52:26 isn't bad though, and I am proud of my time despite not really having a training plan or having a lot of time to train. While I was running, Ben and Tabitha had fun together and tried to find me along the way, but I was too fast. :)Here is Tabitha wearing my finisher's medal.

After the race we packed up and hit the road. Well...apparently I pushed it a little too hard and didn't drink enough fluids, and I ended up throwing up on the way home. Ben, thank God he loves me, took it in stride. I eventually felt better once we were home. Next up, the USAF half marathon on September 18th.