ummm hi.
if you don't remember, since it has been so incredibly long, my name is Natalie. My hubby is Trent. And yes, we still do exist. My blog would say otherwise, but here we are.
Remember how last post (forever ago, about a trip we took even more forever ago?) i was joking that it usually takes me 3 months to post about things? And then i even joked that you would probably be hearing about my half marathon in 3 months? well folks, i guess i wasn't joking. My half marathon was in May. IN MAY. And i am just now about to post about it. But like I always say, better late than never! haha!
Anyways... back in the good old days i used to run.
In December my friend Natalie asked if I wanted to run a half marathon with her. It is actually on my bucket list to run a full marathon, which now I’m not sure if I would ever survive it, BUT I thought a half marathon would be a good start!
So I said yes!
It was so fun to have someone to train with! I would never have done it myself. It was so nice to have someone to report to and be able to motivate each other! Nat and I ran together just about every week, but also did a lot of our own runs since we had such crazy schedules. But we would always check up on each other and make sure we were both on the same page doing the same runs.
We started in January on New Years. It was one of our New Years goals! And we started out big… with ONE mile. Haha. I went to the gym and just about died running a mile and a half. There was no way I could see myself running 13! But… I soon came to find out that
It was so fun to have someone to train with! I would never have done it myself. It was so nice to have someone to report to and be able to motivate each other! Nat and I ran together just about every week, but also did a lot of our own runs since we had such crazy schedules. But we would always check up on each other and make sure we were both on the same page doing the same runs.
We started in January on New Years. It was one of our New Years goals! And we started out big… with ONE mile. Haha. I went to the gym and just about died running a mile and a half. There was no way I could see myself running 13! But… I soon came to find out that
I HATE TREADMILLS!!!
HATE!!!
More than anything.
When we started doing long runs outside, it felt so much easier than doing one little mile on a treadmill. I just hate watching the numbers go up. .01… and then a few seconds later .02… ah I hate it so bad! It goes by forever. And it is always so much hotter in gyms and I about die of heat. My face gets all red and I absorb heat. Trent calls me an oven. Seriously, it takes me a couple hours to return to a normal temperature.
So anyways… I was SOOO grateful we had the best “winter” ever!! I ran outside multiple times a week from January to May, and never had a problem with snow! It was a little cold sometimes, but.. (and this probably surprised me more than anyone!) you really do warm up. Every time I ended up taking my jacket off because I got hot! I can’t even tell you how much I loved this winter! And I am one that has always said I hate being cold, and I would rather be hot than cold. But when it comes to running, I found out I would SO rather have it be cold outside than hot.
One time Nat and I did encounter some rainy weather though. But it was really funny. We tried to duck and cover at this one orchard market thing and were just standing on the front porch and the alarm went off on us!! So we kept running :) and called the cops on the way, haha. Good times!
We slowly worked our way up to doing more and more miles. And I’ll be the first to tell ya, the first three miles are always the hardest! I’ve told everyone, after that your body kind of kicks into autopilot and you can just tune out with your favorite music and watch your body go! Really. That was one of our first runs, a big 2.2 miles.
Okay wait I lied. I guess I did encounter snow this one time. We were babysitting my siblings and took them to the gym, and I thought it would be a good idea to run home (just me, not the kids haha). This is what it looked like at one point, haha!
Sometimes people joke about having to walk up hill both ways in the snow… well I don’t wanna hear it people!
But like I said, I ended up actually getting hot :)
Slowly doing longer runs…
So anyways… I was SOOO grateful we had the best “winter” ever!! I ran outside multiple times a week from January to May, and never had a problem with snow! It was a little cold sometimes, but.. (and this probably surprised me more than anyone!) you really do warm up. Every time I ended up taking my jacket off because I got hot! I can’t even tell you how much I loved this winter! And I am one that has always said I hate being cold, and I would rather be hot than cold. But when it comes to running, I found out I would SO rather have it be cold outside than hot.
One time Nat and I did encounter some rainy weather though. But it was really funny. We tried to duck and cover at this one orchard market thing and were just standing on the front porch and the alarm went off on us!! So we kept running :) and called the cops on the way, haha. Good times!
We slowly worked our way up to doing more and more miles. And I’ll be the first to tell ya, the first three miles are always the hardest! I’ve told everyone, after that your body kind of kicks into autopilot and you can just tune out with your favorite music and watch your body go! Really. That was one of our first runs, a big 2.2 miles.
Okay wait I lied. I guess I did encounter snow this one time. We were babysitting my siblings and took them to the gym, and I thought it would be a good idea to run home (just me, not the kids haha). This is what it looked like at one point, haha!
Sometimes people joke about having to walk up hill both ways in the snow… well I don’t wanna hear it people!
But like I said, I ended up actually getting hot :)
Slowly doing longer runs…
And then we went on our cruise together (which I posted about below) and if you need refreshing, we ran a HUNDRED laps around that forsaken track on the top of that darn boat on the most windiest day of my life. I'm still getting over that one. But it was 10 miles!!
And then before we knew it, it was here! The longest run we had done was that 10 miler on our cruise, so we were a little nervous about the big jump to 13! But it ended up being SO much fun and I loved it!!
This is the line to the bathrooms at the starting line…
Here is us before the race – it was FREEZING. But it was good for me, little miss oven, because I told Nat I flat out wouldn't do it if it was hot! But during the race my prayers were answered and it was just the perfect temperature. :)
And here are some pics our husbands caught during (which by the way they were so cute and went to a few different spots on the trail to see us run by and cheer us on!).
And don’t mind the illegal stealing of pics right here. Don't report me.
My goal was 2 hrs 10 min, and I ended up getting 2 hrs 5 min, wahoo! Next time I am determined to get under 2 hrs… I can see why these things are addicting now!
Yay for running. I loved it and had so much fun doing it! Now I need to find a reason to motivate myself to keep running (which has been next to no motivation haha)… anybody wanna do a relay race or something? I think that would be so fun. Let me know :)
