Get off the Effin' Road ...

Yup, you heard that right. "Get off the effin' road." That's what was yelled at me and my cheetah-wearing girlfriends as we approached mile 6.5 in our half marathon yesterday. Apparently, a pick-up driving road hog did not like that we were running on the OPPOSITE side of the street. Shocking then, funny now.

Obscenities aside, our first ever cheetahlicious half marathon and 10K was fantastic. KT mapped out the course from her house. We were to run a 6.9 mile loop then return to KT's to pick up the rest of the group for the 10K portion of the race. Here's a picture of me and G before the start. Yes, I know you are in awe of how we "rock our socks" ...

Just after 7 a.m., we were off. I had decided ahead of time that I wasn't really going to "race." I wanted to run comfortably and hopefully finish right around a 2:10. Most of the first 6.9 miles was run as a group. We would spread out then come back together. With a 10K remaining, we were averaging 9:45 per mile.

Once we picked up the rest of the group, the course became an out and back. Here's our whole clan (minus myself) running down the killer hill we would revisit at mile 12.9.

Shortly after this picture, the group kind of broke up. I tried my best to hang with Em and Kate (our resident Kenyans), but their slow is still faster than my fast. By mile 9, I was running alone between two groups. Then at the turnaround (around mile 10), I decided to pick up the pace. I was feeling really good and knew it was only about three miles back. I could see Em and Kate off in the distance and just tried to keep them in my sights. With a mile (and the killer hill) left, I booked it for the finish, crossing the line in 2:04:34. A mere 58 seconds slower than the MAC Half that I ran with Katye two weeks ago. The time were nearly identical, but the races were like night and day. In that race with Katye, I thought I was going to die after mile 10, but yesterday, I could have gone one for hours. At the MAC Half, mile 13 was my worst. Yesterday, it was my best. I definitely picked up some lessons for future races. And just for comparison, here are my paces and heart races for the two races.

Rock Your Socks Half vs. MAC Half

mile 1: 9:37 - 143 vs. 9:13 - 147
mile 2: 9:33 - 151 vs. 9:03 - 161
mile 3: 9:40 - 158 vs. 9:00 - 167
mile 4: 9:53 - 160 vs. 8:52 - 171
mile 5: 9:42 - 160 vs. 8:52 - 175
mile 6: 9:56 - 159 vs. 8:56 - 177
mile 7: 9:55 - 160 vs. 8:48 - 180
mile 8: 9:43 - 160 vs. 9:04 - 182
mile 9: 9:18 - 164 vs. 9:12 - 183
mile 10: 9:17 - 166 vs. 9:26 - 183
mile 11: 9:15 - 168 vs. 9:45 - 183
mile 12: 9:08 - 172 vs. 10:36 - 181
mile 13: 8:41 - 175 vs. 11:48 - 176
mile 13.1: 0:51 - 177 vs. 1:00 - 180

FINISH: 2:04:34 vs. 2:03:36

Interesting ...

And don't forget to email me your race recap link, finish time and pictures by Monday at 5 p.m. to be including in the official results!