Well, I did it!
I ran the Hartford Half Marathon on Saturday Oct. 14th!
What a day. It was oddly emotional a few times during the run. I just couldn't get over the fact that less than a year (2/2/2017 surgery date) after having had this life saving surgery I was running 13.1 miles!!!! In a race, in under 2 hours......
Un freakin believable!!!
My official time was 1:53:16! I broke my goal of running sub 2 hours by almost 7 minutes. Approximately 8:30 per mile. I trained pretty hard for this and am so happy at the outcome.
Here are some pictures from Saturday.
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Standing with my kids waiting to head to the starting line.
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T minus 1 minute! Here we go....
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100 yards to the finish line! I spotted my wife and kids cheering me on!
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Exhausted! Time to find some food..... I ate a donut! And a piece of English muffin bread, and a banana, this went on for some time.... I was seriously hungry, borderlined on needing to sit down and not move......
I will say I felt like I had used any and all calorie reserves in the race. Saturday afternoon I was exhausted and had zero energy. It was a chore to get up and do anything. I also ditched the 3 meals a day concept for Saturday and Sunday... I was ravenously hungry. I ate, and ate, and ate...... Pretty much grazed all day. Sunday we went apple picking, and I promptly ate 4 apples..... I just couldn't get enough calories!
Today I feel much better and am back on my plan, eating accordingly.
The real question now is, what next? I need something to train for....... My brain is swelling with possibilities.....
Next year is the question. My current thinking has me doing an Olympic Distance Triathlon in early June, then 2 or 3 sprint distance triathlons and pull it all together in September for a whopping 70.3 miles of Half Ironman fun! I might just run Hartford again in October if I'm not dead yet..... If I can swing the 70.3 then I'll likely be training for a full 140.6 Ironman Triathlon in 2019.
How deep is this rabbit hole I've fallen into?
THIS SURGERY SAVED MY LIFE!!!!!!! Changed it too (100% for the better).
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