RACE REPORT: Boston's Run to Remember Half Marathon

So I finally have a minute to sit down and write the full race report. What a great weekend! It was absoultely BEAUTIFUL here in central MA. Maybe a little too warm for the race....but beautiful none the less! I wish all weekends were 3 days, sunny and 75 - 80 degrees...ahhhh.


Anyways, on to the race report! This was the first time that I was able to run Boston's Run to Remember. It is in memory of all Massachusetts Law Enforcement Officers killed in the line of duty. It always falls on Memorial Day weekend and in the past we have always been out of town. I made sure this year we were going to be around though!


We headed in early, Stephen and Gram E were reading the newspaper on the way...





Parked, peed, and found our way to the 10:00 pace group with about 4 minutes to spare. As you can see in the picture below, the "mostly cloudy" sky that had been forcasted the night before was bright sunshine.....


Me (blue) and my sis (green).


We knew it was going to be a hot one and were going to try to stay together as much as possible. It was pretty much a flat course with the only "hills" being the bridges, so we were hoping to finish around 2:18.


Here we are about half a mile in - notice we are looking at Stephen in the stroller and not the camera! (Sis - green, me - blue)



So the first mile went by pretty fast, but I really started feeling the heat around 2.5 and the negative thoughts began. It wasn't fun at all, and I couldn't stop thinking about how hot I was and how I just needed some water to dump on my head. I ended up stopping and walking 3 to 4 times before mile 4. I was miserable and upset with myself. I rarely am a negative person, especially with sports, but being this hot already, I was so nervous that I wasn't going to finish.


A little after the water stop around mile 4, I was able to turn my thoughts around. I dumped water all over me to cool off, found a little slower pace and was good. By this time we had crossed over the Longfellow Bridge into Cambridge and were running along the Charles River (....love that dirty water.....ohhhh Boston you're my home.....). And then finally Mr. Sun decided to cooperate and tucked behind a cloud! yay!!


For the next 6 miles or so, I was doing great. I had my pace, I had my positive thoughts back, I was finding this running thing exciting again! It was tough around mile 10, since the sun came back out, but we were back on the Boston side of the Charles and we could run in the shadows of the buildings.


Around mile 10.5 I heard one of the funniest things ever and have to share - ya know how in a long race, there are certain people you keep seeing over and over? Well, I had 3 people that I noticed a lot: Orange Shirt Girl, Tie-dye Shirt Girl, and Tall Guy. So Tall Guy was running to my right and just slightly behind me. I was concentrating on staying in the shadows to keep cool, but I hear a female voice behind me ask Tall Guy who he was running with. He responded, "You". Now, I thought this was weird - after 10.5 miles, she doesn't know he is running w/her??? She then responded, "Well, it doesn't look like it! It looks like you're running with HER!", talking about me. Good thing that I had NO extra energy to turn around or say anything back to her!!! hahaha

After I got my water at the aid station at mile 11, I mentally knew that I was good to go for the last 2 miles. I lifted my chin up and enjoyed it, as the crowds were getting a little bigger.



Here is Sister approaching the last .4 (Mom didn't get the camera out in time for me, but that's ok! I was sure to ham it up for all of the on-race photogs!)

After a rough start, both physically and mentally, I am very proud of myself for pulling it together and making it a great race! I ended up finishing in 2:32:54 (an 11:40 pace) and Sis right behind me at 2:35:21 - not the 2:18 we were hoping for, but at least it was not our slowest! (2:37 last August in NYC - talk about heat AND humidity - at least we were spared the humidity yesterday). This was an awesome course and I hope to do it again next year!

Our "finish" photo - Sis chugged too much water right after she finished and she honked in the car on the way home ("What if he honks in the car?" "I give you a no-honk guarantee!" Anyone who knows what movie that's from gets bragging rights!)

So we took our race photo back at home.

Hope everyone else had a GREAT Memorial Day weekend!

Laura