13.1 miles=half marathon!

I DID IT!!!

Yup that's me waving.....exhausted and exhilarated!   It is difficult to put into words what an amazing accomplishment this was for me.  When I crossed the finished line I felt so many different things:

1. Thank you God for helping me finish the race! ( I had been having some pretty bad knee pain and I was a little worried my knee wouldn't hold up-but it did!!) Thank you Dr. Tony Coppola for the phone consultation, diagnosis and advice! :)

2. Holy crap.....are my legs going to give out on me like the woman ahead of me who fell in the street??

3.  How blessed am I? My husband, dad, sisters and friends are all here cheering me on. Yup that's right, I was crying as I hugged them all-but guess what- so was my husband- who NEVER cries, so I guess crying was acceptable at this event.   

4.  Uh oh......I think I already want to run another.  Well you know, after I have recovered from this one and can walk again. 

I ran the first 8 miles of the race with Laura who is a friend of Jason's from high school.  We actually chatted for the first 7 miles or so, and while I probably should have been more focused on my form, breathing and pace, the time FLEW by. When we got to mile 6 we had some fans cheering us on! Kacey and Rossi had literally RUN to mile 6- I think they ran like 2 miles to get there. It was so great to see familiar faces along the race route.  Laura and I parted ways at about mile 8 and that's where the months of training paid off.  I turned up the tunes on my iPod and got in the zone.  I started to feel like the end was never going to be in sight around mile 11, but then once again at mile 12 there were Kacey and Rossi cheering me on.  Thank goodness I wasn't walking at that point-haha! 

Crossing the finish line after running the whole thing was a huge accomplishment for me and one I am very proud of.  Jason, Dad and Kate were there screaming and cheering for me ( and taking some unflattering pictures as well).  Having them at the finish line made the accomplishment that much better! I truly don't think I could have done this without all of their support.  Most importantly the support I got from Jason throughout the months of training and on the day of the race.  He continuously told me he knew I could do it and was always encouraging on the days when I DID NOT want to run.  Here we are together before and after the race:

There were about 20,000 runners in the race and Jason got some great pictures of how crazy the start line was:

Me and Laura-my running buddy:

My amazing support group:

This was an awesome day for me.  I can't wait for the next one!

**Note to self and any other runners out there-I do not suggest heading straight to the airport and sitting for the next 5 hours after running 13. 1 miles- VERY difficult to walk down the jetway and out to the car....VERY difficult :)**