Mardi Gras Half-Mary

So, ummm, hi everyone! It's been awhile... I have no excuse other than I really had nothing going on to write about. Talking about my lackluster training, nutso travel schedule, and the cold weather gets a bit tiresome so I took a break. Anyways, I hope with spring around the corner and the fact I keep signing up for races I will be more motivated to blog (and comment on all your wonderful blogs)! Speaking of races I just got back from one...

This past weekend I pretended to be runner and participated in the New Orleans Mardi Gras half marathon. Going into this race I was looking forward to having fun and finally running a race with my high school best friend and her husband. My heart wasn't into running these past couple months and I was a busy traveler who didn't make the time. Overall, I did everything you aren't supposed to do when getting ready to run 13.1 miles!

We arrived on Friday to cool weather, checked-in to our crazy busy hotel, and headed out to Bourbon Street. You know, the street you should definitely go to 2 days before any race :) We found a great place for dinner and then proceeded to visit different bars to stay out of the rain. Our plan backfired as the later it became the harder the rain fell. We ended up back in our hotel drenched.

Saturday our friends met us at our hotel and we headed over to the expo. They had already been the day before but were nice enough to show me the way Saturday. As I picked up my race number and headed to the area for my t-shirt and packet the volunteer states loudly "Half runners to the left, REAL runners to the right". People got pissed about that comment! And he said it repeatedly. Thank you for volunteering sir but maybe stick with full and half from here on out.

At the expo I proceeded to spend some serious money and sign up for another RnR half marathon here in Chicago. I saved $10 and got another free shirt!

After the expo we proceeded to walk to much and have a pre-race "energy drink"

A pre-race hurricane in New Orleans is a a must! We were good and only had 1. After fueling, we went our separate ways then later the hubs and I headed over to Algiers Point because my friend's Aunt was making pre-race dinner.

Race morning came around too early as it always does... 7am start and I had 3/4 of a mile walk to the start line. We arrived with plenty of time and I found my friend and her Aunt.

My friend's speedy husband didn't stick around for photos he had to go line up behind the elites in corral 1 super early. I think he was hoping a little elite-ness would brush off on him ;) After the pic we found our own corrals and waited...

It was a beautiful day for the race, cool but sunny! And it was so nice to see the sun! At this point I'm not going to give you a play by play on how the race went at each mile. I started great, a little too great, and faded quickly. The uneven roads hurt my ankles and feet like I have never hurt before. By mile 10 I didn't think I had anything left in me. I was cursing myself for not training enough and going out too fast. I really wasn't sure I was going to cross the finish line or if I did I thought for sure I would be walking across it. But somewhere I found something in me to keep going and I crossed it running with a chip time of 1:59:37. A new personal worst, yet still under 2 hours!

After crossing I easily found my friend's husband and my hubs and we proceeded to hang out and wait for my friend and her aunt.

so happy to be done!

After the race we found some food, some beer, and hung around watching Sister Hazel and Cowboy Mouth. While the race was good the post-race was awesome. I was every post race could be so fun!

best post-race food EVER!

Then we finally decided to make the hike to the buses back to the hotel to clean up. That afternoon I had the most amazing po'boy sandwich at Mother's and then we finished up our trip in New Orleans with some more post-race "energy drinks" :) Maybe a few too many because I was hurting the next morning! I may be returning for this race every year. Just next time with a little more training under my belt!