This past Sunday I had a case of the hills along with a dose of the hills and a dash of some more hills! My friend Renee and I decided to head north to Fort Collins to do the Horsetooth Half Marathon. I’ve never done this race before and it looked like it would be fun. Ha! Gonna kick myself the next time I think that! I’ve never been a big fan of hills and this just cemented that idea. First let me show you the race profile….it’s ugly!
I’m one of those people who gets to races entirely too early because you never know what you might encounter on the road to the race. This is why we got there over an hour early, but this did give us great parking! Note: we did have to drive around a rollover accident in Denver at 5 a..m. So glad I have a “Crackberry” to get directions because the DPD were no help.
This is the view from where we parked. Looking up to where we had to go – up onto the dam! Doesn’t look that high in this picture but it was way up there!
Here we are at the start! Renee is super fast! I told her it was going to take me 3 hours to finish and well it did. She said it was going to take her about the same, but ha! She finished in under 2! Kick @ss chicky!
This looking back down the first hill. That’s Hughes Stadium in the background. Okay, see the lady in the white, wide-brimmed hat? She’s 77 years old! Great lady from Boulder. Cheered her on at the finish line! Gosh she looks great! I can only wish to be as fast as her when I’m 77! (heck when I’m 47)
Yippee! Finally made it to the top of the first hill! Only to look over to the next one…see all of the runners ahead of me?! That’s Monster Mountain for those of you keeping track of things on the course profile. This is where I was having serious regrets about entering this race, but I kept going because somewhere in that group was my fast friend Renee. She wouldn’t let me quit!
Okay here’s the view from on top of the dam. Now do you get a feel for how hard that first hill was? And we aren’t even to mile one yet! Kill me now! (my favorite phrase for this race)
View looking back down Monster Mountain!
Made it to the top of Monster Mountain!
Now while you’re out there pounding the pavement, you’re bound to make a few friends. Here are four of them. Bummed I didn’t get their names. The two in pink were running in those “Vibram Five Fingers” shoes and said they had issues at the finish line. We leap-frogged for a while. The two on the right are a father-daughter duo. He was running his first half at 71.5 (his words, not mine)! I told him the story about getting my mom to run her first half at 70 and his response was “why don’t you just give her a loaded gun?” I nearly peed my pants! I stuck around to cheer him on at the finish line too!
Definitely not good at this! But the view is spectacular!
How do you smile while you’re huffing up a hill? You don’t! Shout out to my BRC teammates! Got my Boulder Running Company hat on! Kill me now!
The race course got off the road and onto a bike path. While the change was nice to see since there were more cars on the road, the bike path had too many curves and small hills (great while you’re riding a bike; not great while running a half). The views weren’t that great either so not so many pictures here.
Renee must have gotten worried or just wanted to cheer me on by coming out to just past mile 13 to meet me. I handed off my camera to her and of course she had to take the dreaded butt shots! Showing off my Tough Chik shirt that I TOTALLY earned at the race (join us)! I was so glad to see that finish line. And there were people still there cheering me on. I got some bling and a drinking glass at the finish! Yippee! No beer though – all I wanted was water!
We both were pleased with our times, loved the race, and decided we would never do it again! Whew! That was a hard course! And this is the marks number 15 half marathon for me! Not bad – first one ran on 9/3/2007. I may be slow, but I’m kicking @ss too!
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The Pawsitive Thinker 