How I Trained for a Half Marathon in One Week

I'm going to disclaimer this post right from the beginning that my body has a solid base for running. I've been running on and off for over 11 years. I have four years of high school track in me. After high school I really got into long distance running and ran 40-50 miles per week, every week, at about an 8:30ish+ pace. Despite the fact that I've ran the distance of 13.1 miles many many many times, before last week, I'd only ran one official half marathon before, and I injured my hip during the race and got an awful time. I then had two kids and so my pace is dramatically slower now after all those body changes, but my point is, if you try an run a half marathon in a week and die, I can't be held responsible. 

When I ran my first official half marathon after Derek and I got married back in 2011, it was honestly such a terrible experience for me, that it made me really fearful of ever wanting to do another half marathon ever again. A distance that I loved running, and felt comfortable doing for years, had become this thing that was just straight up terrifying to me. Kind of like when you're obsessed with chocolate ice cream, and you eat it every day, and then all of a sudden it makes you throw up once, and then you never want to eat it again? That's what the half marathon had become for me. 

I've always had this itch in the back of my mind for YEARS now, that I wanted to run a half marathon to prove to myself that I could do it, but there was always a stronger voice inside my head telling me that I couldn't. Over the last several years I've signed up for at least three half marathons, would train for them, get to the 10 mile training run, crack under pressure, and never run the race and waste the money. 

Over the summer I signed up to run a half in Georgia with one of my neighbors, and I thought training for the long runs with her would encourage me to push through this fear that I'd been having and I'd be able to lay all of this to rest. As most of you know, we moved this summer which meant that was yet another wasted race registration to my name. 

Weekends have typically always been hard for me in the sense that everyone who is doing long endurance races like triathlons, marathons, halves, 10k, 5k, etc... they all happen on the weekend. That means that every weekend my social media feeds are constantly flooded by all of these friends doing amazing things, and I'm sitting here wanting to do them, but not being able to put the little voice inside my head telling me I can't to rest. 

Last Sunday, after going through all the weekend finish line posts on social media, I just got fed up. Fed up with myself for giving up so much. I knew that I could physically run a half marathon. deep down, I 100% knew it was feasible for me to do it. So I told the voice in my head telling me I can't to shut it, and just went for it. 

I had originally signed up to run a half marathon on Thanksgiving morning (which I'm still signed up for and planning on!), and began doing this four week half marathon training program. For week one I ran the first four runs on the program, consisting of 3 miles, then 6 miles, then 3 miles, then 7 miles. I finished my 7 mile run Friday morning, and that night I was on the internet at the right time and place, when someone in a local Facebook running group that I'm a part of was giving a way a free race entry for the following night that she could no longer run. I snagged it at the chance thinking, "If I just ran 7 miles, I can easily just double it no problem!" I asked Derek if he had any reservations with me doing it, to which he gave his support, and then it was official. 

When I got to the race, I quickly realized that this was not a very popular race, and figured there were less than 50 people running. (I later found out I was close, with a total of 46 runners). The hard part about running races is battling the voice in your head that doesn't want to come in last, with the voice of reasoning in your head that tells you to run your own race and not worry about what other people are doing. 

As the race started, the field stretched out pretty quickly, and as I assumed would happen, I found myself all on my own for a majority of the entire race. I only passed four people the entire race, and went stretches of about 5 miles without seeing anyone on the course. My previous half marathon PR was 2 hours, 46 minutes, so my only real goal was to beat that, but I also would have loved to come in under 2 hours, 30 minutes, and even better if I got 2 hours 20 minutes. Realistically I assumed I would be running a 11:06/mile pace the entire race, and my phone told me to expect that too based off my other runs.

About 4 miles into the race I was at a steady 10:40ish pace, and kept telling myself that I needed to slow down or I wasn't going to have anything left at the end of the race. At mile 5 though, I saw two guys ahead of me, and I really didn't want to miss my chance at passing someone, so I just went for it. And I didn't want them to catch up with me, so I just kept going and going. When we got to the half way point at mile 6.5, I saw another runner who had just started walking, and I blew passed him, and continued to give it my all. 

At mile 7 though, things started to go downhill. I had been running with my phone (with my music and nike tracking app on) inside my sports bra, because I had a water bottle in my hand, so I couldn't carry it. Apparently the sweat from my chest got into my phone, caused it to short circuit, and then my phone started vibrating and would not stop. I tried turning my phone off and back on (which meant turning off my Nike app and losing all my tracking data from the race which killed me!) and it still wouldn't work. 

I then, while running still (I'm really proud to say I never walked the entire time!) called Derek to see if he could google and troubleshoot what was going on, to which he only came up with, I had to deal with it and wait for it to stop, or for the battery to die. 

There were no mile markers on the course, and only a couple aid stations. I'd passed one aid station at mile 8, and knew there was another one at mile 12, but those four miles in between I had no idea where I was, so my only choice was to just keep pushing as hard as I could. My legs and feet were dead at mile 8 too, so I really learned what it meant to fight through the pain. 

Finally my phone stopped vibrating and I was able to use google maps to see how far I was from the finish line at The Great Saltair and was excited to see I only had two miles left. I kept giving it my all, when all of a sudden this guy passed me out of no where... and then 10 seconds later he started walking. 

I decided I wasn't going to let him play this "pass-me-walk-pass-me-walk" game, so again, I took off. About a mile left in the race I saw him coming again from the corner of my eye and thought "oh nuh-uh!", and started sprinting with whatever I had left in my legs towards the finish. 

Crossing that finish line was one of the most rewarding things in my entire life. It felt like I had really beaten this beast that had been looming over my head for years now. The icing on the cake was the 26 minute PR that I had gotten, with a time of 2 hours, 20 minutes, 8 seconds, with an average pace of 10:41 per mile. 

After the race I knew I needed to get calories and fluids back in me, and was SUPER disappointed to learn that they had no Gatorade at the finish line. The only thing that wasn't water (I really wanted calories at this point!) was some cherry Dr. Pepper. I took a can and drank a few sips and my stomach immediately rejected it. I tossed it in the trash and ran outside the building and started dry heaving in the parking lot. It was awful. Every twist, turn, and bump in the road on the drive home felt like death, but once I finally made it home, in the tub, and sipping on some pedialyte, life got a lot better. 

I'm grateful to know my body can still go the distance. I'm eagerly looking forward to waking up tomorrow and doing a 6 mile training run in preparation for my Thanksgiving half marathon. I'm looking forward to beating my PR time again, and am playing with the idea of a full marathon next spring, because I'm feeling pretty darn invincible right now.