Pictures from my 1/2 marathon

The Get-Along-Gang:
Jamey, Heidi, Cheri, Carie, Bruce, Jason & Tiffany

Pre-race "carb loading" pasta dinner. You can click on this to see my friend Carie's post on the race.

This was taken just before the race started downtown at Crown Center. (Hallmark's HQ) I'd like to say that these are some of the finest people I've ever known. Good down to earth, loving friends. We gathered together for prayer before the race started.
For me that was one of the highlights of the race. Giving thanks for healthy bodies, that can do amazing things. Giving thanks for friendship and the beautiful creations of the earth. Our Heavenly Father loves us.

This one is from the Kansas City Star.
Things I learned about myself.
1. I can do hard things.
2. I can't stand for any strand of hair to touch me while I am running, thus the severe Fraulein hair-do.
3. Be careful not to drop your headband/ear warmer while you are in the port-a-pottie. Your ears will be cold the rest of the race.
4. Good friends can make all the difference.

This is me on the plaza at about mile 7, waving to the Koford family. It was so nice to see familiar faces! My friend Tiffany Whitney & I ran together the entire race. Running with friends works well for me. We didn't use ipods the entire race. We visited, encouraged each other, cried together...and kept on running. Our mission was to finish in 3 hours. We beat our goal by 18 minutes!
*Side note: I did use an ipod to train though and now suddenly it has died! Drat. Looks like I better start saving up for a new one.

The finish line, I'm not in this one but you get the idea. Matt ran to the car to get the camera and missed me finishing the race. There are lots of pictures online of the finish and the entire race. You can go here to view those. It won't let me copy them b/c they are for sale. But you can see that I actually finished!

Post race still on a runner's high. It was SO cold though, we left pretty quickly after we ate and took pictures.

My sweet boys brought me flowers! I loved having them there at the finish. Thanks Matt, I love you!

This entire training experience has been wonderful. Never in my life would I have thought I'd commit to run 13.1 miles for fun without someone chasing me.
I can see how people get addicted to running road races.

In summary if you are still reading (Grandma & Grandpa) there were about 11,000 runners there. The air was filled with a great sense of camaraderie, fun and excitement. There were several moments in the race when I would tear up with emotion and joy. There were runners wearing shirts that said things like "you think this 1/2 marathon is hard? You should try chemotherapy!" and "Honk if I'm walking" and "running in memory of..." I literally loved every moment.

All 2 hours and 42 minutes.