April Fools Jester Challenge Half Marathon #REALwomenmove

Yesterday was part two of the Jester Challenge. We woke up early once again, and leisurely got ready for the race. Being so close to the start had advantages! CA woke up with some ab pain and her Achilles was really bothering her, so she decided to skip the half.

We found all of our friends and said hello to them and posed for some pics before it was time to start. My PF was really bothering me from Saturday's run, and I told Eileen that I might just walk the whole thing. 

Once the race started and I ran a bit, my foot started to warm up, and running was less painful. Saturday's 7 mile run and 8 miles of walking afterwards definitely took its toll, though, and my legs were tired. The first 4-5 miles I managed to maintain a 13 minute mile. I starte doing the math in my head, and realized that if I maintained at least 14 minute miles for the rest of the race, I would finish under three hours for the first time all year. 

The course was another out and back, with a few miles of road, but mostly Boardwalk. I loved seeing all of my friends during the loop back, and saw that Eileen was ahead of me by about a mile. 

Once we got to about mile 10, it got really hard. My legs were just.so.tired. This PF is really kicking my butt! I managed to maintain about a 14 minute mile, but vote was rough.

They do not block off any of the boardwalk for the runners and the pwople just didn't care that a race was going on. There were more than a few very rude people who saw runners coming and actually spread out instead of moving out of the way! Ugh!

I had to go wide more than once as I made my way to the side of the boardwalk where the finish was.

But there it was!

It was such a relief to see it, and to see 2:57:01 on my watch as I hit 13.1 miles!

We got double bling, and they had popcorn and soft pretzels, as well as bottled water. Very little Gatorade was left, which was fine with me, but there were runners behind me who might want some!

 

My official time was 2:58 which cracked me up because my watch was behind the entire time, expect that last .1 where it jumped ahead! 

The bling was so worth it. Because we couldn't get early enough checkout, we had to change at the hotel and shower at home. Luckily, a quick drive fixed that problem and I parked myself on the couch for the rest of the day!

Did you run this weekend? Have you done back to back races?