Philadelphia Half Marathon 2014 Race Recap

Philly Half Marathon Race Recap 2014- aka joining the sub 2:00 club!

You know, a normal family running outing.

My senior year of high school I ran my second half marathon, or tried to. I DNF'ed at mile four after dislocating my knee and falling on the cement. The knee wouldn't go back in for several minutes so I had to go to the emergency room. The nurse that came in to the room asked me what I'd been doing when I fell and I told her I had been running a half marathon, that I was a runner. "Oh you're awfully large for that, aren't you?" She said, "my niece runs cross country, but she's tiny." It's embarrassing that that is something I can remember word for word when it happened almost four years ago, but nevertheless, those words have gone through my mind multiple times. Today was a turning point. I finished the Philadelphia half marathon in 1:57:29 and I cried when I finished. I've been trying to break 2:00 for three years now and there's been problem after problem. If something can happen to you during a race, chances are it's happened to me over the past four years. I've broken bones, gotten stress fractures, torn muscles, gotten sick, the list is long. None of these things are necessarily symptoms of my training, but when you have that much bad luck, you begin to worry if you will always have bad luck. I am not the skinniest runner, I am not the fastest runner, my school comes before my running- these are all obvious obstacles. And while I really do love running, I will admit that after my heartbreaking 2:18 in Baltimore this October (I got a cold the week before that left me so dehydrated I walked a decent portion), I was having some serious doubts. A normal runner would tackle this doubt with better, different training, but with Philadelphia just two weeks before my final exams, I had run a total of ten miles (all on the treadmill) the week before and was running on very little sleep. This is probably not how the pros do it.


That being said, when I toed the line this morning, I was determined. I felt good, the weather was perfect, I could do this. Then my watch stopped working. I decided immediately that I wasn't going to let my inability to remember to charge my watch ruin my run so I ran the whole race solely by looking at the clock time, and subtracting 4 minutes, (the time it took me to get to the start line) and match it with my pace band. I was able to run 8:55 minute miles every time almost exactly. I tuned almost everything out and obsessively monitored myself hoping nothing would go wrong but preparing myself for when it eventually did. But then an amazing thing happened- I got to mile 12 and I was almost exactly on target to run 2:00. I knew I could run sub two, my secret goal the whole time, If I just pushed a little harder. It's such a strange thing, purposely making yourself hurt to do just a little better. But when I got to the finish, I knew I had done it! I actually started crying. I saw my dad and he was waving at me and I told him immediately that I had finally cracked 2:00 because I knew he would get it.
I am not an "ideal" runner. At 5'11" and 150 lbs, I'm never winning a marathon or anything, but i think you would be hard pressed to find a person who loves this sport more than me. A part of me wishes I could go back to that day and tell that nurse how wrong she was. In reality, I'm sure she had no idea that what she said would stay with me for as long as it has. But I know now that I can do it. You can go to school and I have a job, and not be a tiny stick and still accomplish your goals. Anyone can be a runner- I'm a runner :)