UTAH VALLEY MARATHON

Everyone keeps asking me for the gory details of the race but there really weren't any.  It was the freakin coolest thing I've ever done!  I'm still so pumped and hyped up over it.  Last night I was laying in bed and thought did I really do that?  I'm a marathoner?!?!  I'm bomb diggity!  It's fair to say that running has gone from a hobby to an obsession.  Wow.  I need to relax.  Can you tell I loved it?
Since it was my first full marathon I had no idea what to expect and I trained HARD.  Usually while training for a race if I have to miss a day of running it's not a big deal but I didn't miss a single day while training for this race.  I planned everything around my running schedule.  Now I'm happy to know that I can miss a day here or there and it's still doable.  The day before the race I was psyched!  I woke up at 6 on Friday morning and jumped out of bed because the race was the next day and I couldn't just lay there!  I was so sick on Friday.  I think I was as anxious, nervous and excited as I was the day before I was induced to have a baby.  Not only was I worried about myself and whether or not my body could really run 26.2 miles AND run it in my goal time but I was super worried about my little brother Andrew.  He signed up and was excited to run the race with me but had no idea what was coming.  The most he ran while training was 10 miles.  On Wednesday he had grad night and stayed up all night long, Thursday he climbed Lone Peak (one of the tallest mountains in Utah) and on Friday he weight lifted and went ice skating on a date which of course kept him out all night, then we he was supposed to run the marathon the next day.  I honestly didn't think he would make it past mile 18, which would be humiliating.  Andrew and I decided we weren't going to run together.  I can run a lot further but his pace is a lot faster.  So the gun goes off and off we go!  It was awesome!  At mile 13 I was so excited because that was the half marathon mark and the furthest I'd ever gone in a race and I still felt great!  At about mile 18 I passed the race pacer who had the 3 hour and 45 min goal.  Words cannot explain how excited I was!  I had absolutely no idea how long this was going to take me.  I didn't train at a certain pace.  I was just training to finish.  My goal was just to finish under 5 hours.  I didn't know how that would go I just hoped and assumed it would be doable and I didn't want to set myself up for failure by making an unrealistic goal.  I searched for Andrew the whole time and never saw him which had me concerned because I thought there was no way he would be that fast without training and with the crazy week he had beforehand.  Around mile 20 there was a big sign that said "push through your wall!"  What wall?!  I'm on a roll baby!  I was so happy with how well I felt.  None of my joints were hurting which was my biggest concern.  At mile 23 I needed to get water and they didn't have any ready.  I do NOT walk.  I always jog through the aid stations and no matter how tired I am I refuse to walk, I'll push through the pain.  Because hey didn't have water ready I had no choice but to walk through the aid station if I wanted water, which I desperately needed.  It killed me!  When I picked my legs back up to run again my legs felt like concrete.  They were so heavy and got so tight so fast.  The last 3.2 miles felt longer that the first 23.  They were rough, but I did run the rest of the way.  I saw my Dad in the crowd about half a mile from the finish line, ran and gave him a high five and then he ran though the crowd the rest of the way with me.  I saw my mom and sister in law right before I got to the finish line.  My sister in law was freaking out screaming for me which I SO loved!  There were also so many people for the last couple of miles with there hands out ready to give high fives.  The little kids would get so excited.  It was pretty cool!  I finished in 4:20.  Not fast but it was faster than my goal time.  As soon as I saw my Mom I asked her where Andrew was and she said she hadn't seen him yet.  I started to panic.  Then she told me she hadn't seen him yet because he was so fast, he finished the race before they even got there!  He ran it in 3:20.  Holy smokes!  Punk!  It was amazing!  So much better than I thought it would be. Trevor's sister Ashlie and her husband ran the 10k too!  They did awesome!  Before I ran the race I wondered if after I ran it, it would be something I would want to do again.  I start official training for my next marathon on Monday!