26.2

Over the summer I trained for a marathon.
I had to shorten my training schedule because I signed up for a marathon that was earlier than anticipated. When I started increasing my miles too fast I got some aches and pains. My knees hurt and I tore something in my leg. I had to ice everyday. Icing helped a lot and by the end of training I no longer needed to ice and my knees felt good.

Here is where my ankle swelled and bruised because I tore something.

Sodium chloride.
Tennessee is very hot and humid! I would be completely drenched after my long or hard workouts. For some of my long runs I would wake up at 4 am to be done before it got too hot.
After my long runs Marshal would like to lick me because of how salty I got.

Josh got me this nifty super cool water belt. It held 40 oz of water and I would drink it all on one run and then drink a full nalgene (32 oz) when I got home.

The shoes that carried me through it all.

All the rolling hills were good for my calves.

I loved running in TN! It was so beautiful and peaceful. There were rolling hills of farmland. I miss running there!

I trained hard.
I was hoping to get under 3:30.
Didn't happen.
At the start I heard that people usually go 10-20 minutes slower on this course because half the marathon was on gravel. There was also a three mile hill at mile18. I thought it wouldn't apply to me. I was a little over confident and thought I would be fine. I also wanted to be the first girl in, I ended up being the fourth. I did great the first half and was in 1-2 position with average pace 7:45, but then I started slowing down. My butt got kicked! My time was 3:45.

My nice blood blister.

There's always next year.