This past Sunday, April 28, 2013 I was lucky to be chosen in a lottery to run with 14,999 other runners in the Nike Women’s inaugural Half Marathon in Washington, DC. I have done the Nike Women’s Half before in San Francisco in 2007 but this time I did it with a couple friends and made a little weekend road trip out of it. My friend Heather and I drove with our boyfriends to the DC area where we met up with Erika (another race buddy) and her cousin. Whenever Nike comes to town, a portion of the city shuts down and caters to the race. Thus a majority of Saturday was spent at the Nike Expotique where we picked up our race packets and enjoyed a bunch of freebies from Nike and other race sponsers (Luna, Bare Minerals, Paul Mitchell, Nuun, etc). We also shopped at Nike Georgetown where they were offering a lot of event gear specific to this year’s race. We even had some pampering done at a store called Lush that sells homemade, organic body products that doesn’t test on animals. They gave us their “signature” hand treatment…and of course I ended up buying at least $50 worth of their products, including their solid toothpaste ‘Toothy Tabs’ which of course I could not resist trying (stay tuned for a future blog post on my review of this product). We carb’ed up during early dinner and then rested our sore tourist feet (not the greatest of ideas) in preparation for race day.
The next morning, I found myself nervously jumping around at 6:50AM at the starting line with my two running buddies Heather and Erika. Even the most mundane decisions become crucial when mixed with adrenaline: should I keep my sweatshirt on for the start of the race then get rid of it later or just take it off now? Do I need to use the bathroom now or wait until after? Will I be able to finish the race painlessly or in agony? Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not the most dedicated runner. Nike offers a structured and easy-to-follow 12 week training program to prep for the half marathon. Between my work schedule, an endless winter on the East Coast (not lending itself to comfortable outdoor runs), on-and-off colds and just plain lack of motivation I did not follow the schedule. Plus my half marathon goal is usually just to finish and have fun touring a city on foot with friends while running for a good cause (The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society) and not feeling pain in the process. I’ve completed enough half marathons in the past that 13.1 miles isn’t so intimidating (of course, 26.2 would be a different story). Needless to say, the race started and off we went. It was the perfect sunny morning and the perfect temperature to do a 13.1 mile run around the nation’s capital. Roughly two hours later, we finished at the same corner of Pennsylvania & 11th, triumphant with our finisher’s t-shirts and Tiffany finisher necklace in hand. I highly recommend anyone (male or female, as the race doesn’t discriminate) who has ever wanted to do a half marathon to do one of the Nike Half Marathons. Not only do they have the ability to create a party out of a half marathon weekend but they also never cease to improve on the experience. This year they created a website with ‘Live Runner Tracking’ which allows anyone (race spectator or remote stalker) to track a specific runner in real-time with just a bib#. The website also offered ‘Share My Run’ which lets runners set preset Facebook posts which automatically update as they pass through certain designated race locations. (top photo via betweenfriendsblog.com)
Here are some weekend and race day highlights that my boyfriend Mike (and #1 fan) took with his snazzy camera and some from my iphone:
TheTrendySmile 
