the country music half marathon has bands play all along the race course and justin was in one of the bands. he had to be there at 6 am which meant he dropped my off at the starting line at 5:45 am. EARLY! plus it was raining. right after we took this picture, it really started pouring! we were drenched. this is my friend, rana, who ran with me. we were in corral 24 out of 32. there were about 1,000 people per corral, so it was a pretty big race-30,000+ people. the first gun went off at 7:00, but they do a wave start, so we didn't actually get to 
start until almost 8! rana and i ran together until about mile 9. it was fun to see her husband and mom cheering us on at miles 4 and 7. at mile 9, rana needed to stop to tie her shoe and wanted to walk a while, i wanted to keep running, so we split up. at mile 11.5 i got to see justin playing and it was fun to see him waving at me from up on stage. after that, it was killer. that last 1.5 miles are the most hilly 
and that last mile i wanted to die. my knees had been hurting from the first mile and by now, my left knee was about to give out. but i made it and finished in 2:46. not quite as fast as i had hoped but still good. my times for each section of the race were:
first 3 miles: 39 minutes
second 3 miles: 39 minutes
next 4 miles: 53 minutes
last 3 miles: 35 minutes
it was great to see erich and rana's mom and our friends, chris and colleen cheering me on at the finish line. by the time i got through the maze at the finish line, grabbed my stuff and met back up with erich and rana, my legs were about to give out. they took me over to justin's band stand and i watched them cheer on the last of the full marathoners. home to pizza and a nap-a good day!
