13.1 x 10

I ran my 10th half-marathon yesterday. It was a total last-minute, impulse, insane thing. I was supposed to have run 13 miles last weekend, and 11 this weekend in preparation for the Napa Half Marathon next weekend - what was to have been my 10th memorial half. That's a good one, right? Wine country, a killer medal, free vino at the end.

But since we got back from Mexico, I've been having a tough time getting motivated to run. So on Wednesday, my sister sends me a newsletter from South Jordan about soccer and swim lessons and stuff and - boop! - there it is. There's a half marathon on Saturday and it's only 40 bucks. Boo-yah! My motivation is right here! In email! Sign me up! But not until I've convinced my equally-crazy friend, Natalie, to off-the-couch this half marathon with me. And, of course, she says...hell yah! Sometimes I really hate her. Can't I have one friend who is the voice of reason? So we sign up on Wednesday for a half-marathon on Saturday. Christi says...you have the biggest balls of any chick I know. Big balls or little brains. It's one or the other!

Luckily (or not, depending on how you look at it), we didn't look at the course before we signed up. Or picked up our race packets. Quote from the race director the night before the race: "Be ready for hills, hills, and more hills!!  And just when you think it is clear running...there is 1 more hill!" Oh shit. Natalie and I haven't run more than a couple of miles at a time in 3 weeks. Mayday.

So we show up for the run, and there's literally no one there. Hi, little teenage sullen volunteer girl, how many people are running? "Uh...there are 67 registered." SIXTY-SEVEN? Are you kidding me?! Huntington has like 13,000. 67?! Like less than 100? Judging by the little pod of people clustered at the "start line" (it gets quotes because the obligatory balloon arch was absent), this might not really count as a race after all.

I struggled through the run. No lie. I felt under-fueled, it was hot, it was a headwind no matter what direction we were headed, that dude was not lying about the hills, and with no people-watching to distract you thirteen miles is like a fucking eternity.

But we finished. In two hours and 45 minutes (exactly what we guessed, for the record). We weren't last. We think we beat at least 5 or 6 people, although they may have been ill or had nice friends who picked them up in a car and took them to breakfast. So we were congratulating ourselves on making our guess-timated time, and finishing the highest place in any race ever (must have been like 54th and 55th although this race apparently does not publish results). And then the race director came over and asked us if we got LOST. Seriously, dude? Seriously!

But my favorite part of the whole run was Natalie. Not only is she a ball to run with, even when I'm pussing out and walking more than I should but as we're gingerly folding our sore, salt-lick bodies into the car afterwards, she hands me this medal (the 40-dollar registration fee apparently did not include medals for back-of-the-pack participants). "In honor of your 10th half-marathon, you deserve a medal. We both do!" She got these fabulous runner medals engraved with "OFF THE COUCH SOJO HALF 2011". Super cool. That girl is, as always, one of the coolest chicks I know.

So, good training run. Glad it's done. Not sure about signing up for that one again although I am kind of determined to actually run up those hills, not walk them. I do love a challenge. Apparently that's what happens when you have balls.