1. Waking up on time: I couldn’t sleep the night before the race. I kept having nightmares that I would wake up late for the race and start crying. I guess I can say Nina slept for me. We woke up at 5am so I could have enough time to shower and dress, eat breakfast and, warm up.
2. Eat Breakfast: I did have a chance to eat a light breakfast before the race. As I said before, I normally do not eat before running, but I didn’t want to start the race on low fuel. So I ate a banana, a piece of toast, and a little bit of coffee. I also took some GU when I got back to the room.
3. Items to carry: I decided not to carry anything with me during the race. I wanted to feel as light as possible and didn’t want to feel bogged down with crap attached to me. Nina gave me her Garmin to wear so I could pace myself during the race. Man, that helped a lot!
4. Warm Up: Our hotel was in Covington, KY which is right across the Ohio River. It was about 15 minutes from the starting line. As we started to leave the hotel, Nina noticed that I didn’t have on my chip. Whew, that was close! I ran back to the room to retrieve my chip then Nina and I walked briskly to the starting line with minutes to spare.
5. Line up position: By the time I reached the starting line, the wheelchair racers were just taking off. I had 5 minutes to put on my chip and get to my position. The elite and fast runners were at the front of the line, of course. By the time I put the chip on my shoe, the ten second countdown began. There was no way I was going to make it to the middle of the pack by then. So I stayed at the front with the fast runners and began to run.
6. Pace: Surprisingly enough, I did not start off too fast. I knew that I was surrounded by fast runners and hoped that they did not get irritated with me because I was in their way. I tried to find a place close to the sidewalk and continued to run at a 10 to 11 minute pace. As the first few miles went by, it was really hard to take walk breaks. I just wanted to continue running, but I knew that walking would pay off in the long run.
Around mile 6 the hills started. When I heard that Cincinnati was hilly, I was expecting hills like Franklin. Those hills were nothing! It was like bumps in the road! As I passed some of the runners, I could hear them breathing like they were having an Asthma attack. Give me a break! It was at that point I was thankful for training in town instead of using the inclines on a treadmill. The hills lasted for about 2.5 miles.
As I turned the corner to reach mile 9, it was all downhill. The runners around me were excited and I talked with a few runners as we laughed and enjoyed the easily ride to the finish line. Mile 10 came and went. I surprised that I didn’t “hit the wall” as some like to call it. I continued to take walk breaks and get Gatorade at the pits stops until mile 12.
I could hear the roar of the crowd as I got closer to the finish line. It was very exciting. I knew I was going to finish. When I saw the finish line I threw my hands in the air and shouted with joy that I did it! I kicked up the pace, going from a 9:30 pace to 7:45 pace and continued until I go to the finish line. 2:17:06 was my final time.
I finished in 2:17:06! I couldn’t believe it!! That’s almost 13 minutes below the time I set for myself (2:30:00)! The average time to finish was 2:31:09. Over 22,000 runners participated in the Flying Pig Weekend races. 8,594 ran the half marathon. There were 5,465 females and 3,129 males. Overall, I was 3860 out of the 8,000+ runners, and 1,834 out of the 5,000+ female runners.
I cannot take God enough for allowing me to experience such an event. I would like to thank him for bringing Nina into my life. She allowed me to think beyond and try for something that I wouldn’t have dreamed of doing.
I’m definitely planning to do another half marathon before the year is over. It’s such an honor for me to be a part of a group of athletes that I can share an interest with. I’m planning to run the Anderson’s Midnight Flight 10k so I can beat the crap out of my best friend’s ex. 
After that, I plan to run another half marathon before the year is out and train for the Flying Pig Marathon in 2010. I’ll save the Boston Marathon until 2011 when I turn 26.
