Well I survived the Air Force Marathon last Saturday! Not only that, but my training paid off and i PR'd by 4 minutes with a 4:45:07. I'm pretty happy about that.
The official time says 07 seconds and were gonna go with that, thank you
The race was amazing. They had great support from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base with the start and finish at the Air Force Museum and service members throughout the course pulling security, manning aide stations, and cheering us on. The other volunteers were great, too. Lots of support all along the course and frequent Gatorade and snack points. That's my kinda race!
At the end, you ran under the wings of different Air Force aircraft and then got your medal presented by a high ranking officer (2-star general!). It was a very cool experience.
Overall, I would recommend this race to anyone. Even the people if the local town come out and cheer you on as you run down main street. There's a couple hills, 2 or 3 within the last 5 miles, but apparently not enough to keep me from PR'ing, so i won't complain. Maybe all that training is starting to pay off? Who would have thought! Maybe there's a 4:30 somewhere in my future...
Me and the momma in our swag
Now that I've praised it, let me voice my ONE complaint. First, a compliment - plenty of parking and more volunteers out there guiding us in. BUT if parking is going to be more than a mile from the start line (1.27 to be exact) please, PLEASE, put some porta potties out there! Runners, you can understand what it's like before a race. When you gotta go, you gotta go, and we had to high tail it that far before getting to the first set of porta johns at the start line. It would have been nice to have a couple out in the parking field. Once that emergency was avoided though, everything else was great!
Now, I need to come clean about my eating habits leading up to the race. We ate and ate and ate and enjoyed every bite. We were definitely fueled for the race, but I'm currently trying to burn off the extra pounds (multiple) I packed on in the process. Totally worth it though.
The race was in Ohio, but I spent some time with my family in St Louis prior. St Louis happens to be home of Jilly's Cupcakes, 2 time winner of cupcake wars, and they also just started making ice cream that has chunks of cupcake in it. That morning, we went to Original Pancake House, best pancakes I've ever had, then attacked Jilly's. I'm telling you, we went all out. Lunch was a tame shared bowl of mac n cheese and veggie quesadilla, but then the four of us devoured a pint of their Island in the Sun ice cream. Then we split four cupcakes so we could each try a little of four different flavors. Now these aren't your typical cupcakes. These are fully loaded, topped, crammed, sprinkled, full of goodies. Seriously, if you find yourself in St Louis, do yourself a favor and go there.
After the expo, me and the momma went to First Watch and split a veggie burger and quinoa salad with butternut squash, goat cheese, walnuts and balsamic vinaigrette. Sadly, I think the quinoa was cooked in chicken broth so our tummies were upset later, but it was so tasty that I'd do it again!
The last meal I need to tell you about is our carbo loading finale - a bread salad. BREAD SALAD - warm bread, olives, peppers, tomatoes, mozzarella cheese and more balsamic. It was amazing. It was warm and the bread soaked up the balsamic... *drool*... Then we split a bowl of gnocci with a mushroom sauce.
Everything was so amazing. For a moment there I thought about giving up weight watchers and eating like this forever! Then I got on the scale, had a little panic attack and I'm back on the wagon.
Now I have the Marine Corps Marathon at the end of October, but I think I may have done some damage to my foot. I've been in pain since mile 25 last Saturday, so I'm going to the doctor tomorrow. Fingers crossed that I didn't do any real damage!
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