Finishing a Frigid February of Races

February races = DONE. I ran a race every Sunday in February (5K, 5K, 10K, half marathon). The goal of these races was just to get my butt outside and run. Now that my injury isn’t so bad, I’m able to run more, but it’s been tough to motivate myself to do it, after running only on race days for so many months. It’s even harder to get out there in the winter, and this winter has been cold.

Scot and I traveled to Columbus OH to visit my friends and family, and to run Last Chance for Boston. Two years ago, this half marathon was my qualifying race for Half Fanatics. This year, I repeated that distance, and Scot ran the full marathon to maintain his streak of one marathon per month since September 2012.


Early marathon starters: Andrea, Scot, Jennifer, Bill, Pascal

At the half marathon start: Jeff, Tammy, Me, Jenn

Last Chance for Boston doesn’t have an interesting course; it’s one-mile loops through a suburban office park. But it is a well-managed event for the mid-winter small marathon that it is. Scot and some other Marathon Maniacs and 50 Staters took the early start at 6:30 AM and headed off in the dark. My race started at 8:00 AM, so I waited inside the host hotel with my mom, who had come out to spectate.

I knew more people this year at Last Chance for Boston, and I met a few new faces too. The highlight was running most of my race with two-time 50 States finisher Bill Whipp. I’d met Bill last summer when we both did the MAD Marathon (Idaho) and Madison Marathon (Montana) double. He’s a great guy with lots of stories about marathons and marathoners past and present. Bill is a walker, but it’s a fast walk given his long legs. I did a shuffle alongside him. It was a little slower than my normal pace, but felt good on that cold day, as I was only counting this as a training run anyway.

With Bill Whipp...and that's about what the entire course looked like

Scot on the course

 

There’s not much more to tell about this race. We just kept going in circles until we’d counted our last laps. The medal was the same for all finishers, regardless of distance (there were also a 5K and a 10K). It was a big step up from the cheap medal with a sticker from two years ago (pictured in this old blog post). This one was a cast snowflake medal that coordinated nicely with the tech shirt. It was appropriate that we had some snow flurries during the race.

Finishers with Magenta the Road Trip Flamingo

Cold, and DONE!

 

After Scot finished, we headed back “home” to get warm and showered. My mom made a meal of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup. And then we were on our way to drive home to Arlington VA. During the weekend, I was able to squeeze in a visit with stepmom Kim and friends Nikki and Shelly while in town on this super-quick whirlwind trip, so I’ll say that it was a success.

The apropos snowflake medal, a nice upgrade from years past

Wearing my t-shirt and medal with my Mom post-race

 

Next up: five races of varying distances planned for the five weekends in March. I’m keeping up my one race per week streak for a little while longer!