Hobble Creek Half Marathon Race Report

I ran this race last weekend, but just got around to writing the report. If you saw the cryptic message of 1:27:03 showing up on my facebook status last week, here's the back story.

We had a busy day on Friday. We took the kids on the Heber Creeper, then went rafting on the Provo River, then had shakes at Granny's, then rode the chair lift up at Sundance, then had dinner at Brick Oven. With a belly full of pizza and milkshake, I fell asleep alongside Maren at about 9pm.

We spent the night at my IL's cabin in Hobble Creek Canyon, and the race ran right past the entrance to their neighborhood. So I was able to wake up relatively late (5!), ride down the canyon, and hop on a bus. By the time I made it up there, some of my running group arrived and we shivered and hopped as the sun rose too high while we waited for the race to begin. I saw Sheree and was really happy to see her. There are five or six "fast girls" in my running group, and four of us were running the race, and we all decided to head out together (with our coach) in hopes of finishing in the 1:30 range. Coach and I ran side-by-side, and the other three girls weren't far behind.

The first seven or eight miles of the race were really fun-- fast, cool and easy with the downhill. But I knew when the race started late that it was going to get hot, and it did around mile 8. Then it became a matter of enduring. I knew I was slowing down a little bit (my first four miles were all in the 6:20 range) but the key was not to slow down too much before the finish.

Finally, I saw the sign indicating the last half mile. It felt like it lasted forever. I could see what I thought was the finish line. But it wasn't it. Then I spotted something further down the road that looked like it, but it wasn't it either. Finally, I turned a corner and ran in. The time said just under 1:27 as I started through the finisher's chute, and I crossed the line at 1:27:03. Although I'd lost my girlfriends around mile 5 and my coach around mile 8, one of the girls had saved a lot for her finish and came in about 5 seconds behind me. We stood on the sidelines and cheered in the people in our group until everyone finished.

Then I jumped back in my car and drove to the cabin, where my mom was waiting for me so she could do her workout. While I was gone, she walked 60 times around my IL's cabin, and was depressed to discover that each lap was only 227 feet. I grabbed a calculator as she walked out the door, but wasn't able to catch her in time to tell her that she'd actually walked 3 miles! She didn't come back until she'd walked six more, and by now it was the heat of midday. She'd never hiked the Y before, and she wanted to do it (and we'd told the kids we would), so after she showered, we drove to Provo, where I strapped Maren and a lot of water into my backpack, and we spent the next hour and a half sweating our way up and down Y mountain. Honestly, I'm not sure if running the race or wearing a 3 1/2-year-old up the side of a mountain in 90+ degree weather was harder. The kids were all troupers, and we rewarded them with a late lunch at the Creamery, where I ate every bit of my cheeseburger, fries, and ice cream sundae.

When I got home, I had texts from friends in my group letting me know that I'd placed 1st in my age group and had won a plaque and a pair of socks! (LOL!). The race was a 5 minute PR for me, and my overall pace was 6:39/mile.