Viola 1/2 Marathon

Saturday morning my alarm went off at 4am.  I got up, threw on my running clothes and hit the door.  I met up with Alissa and Marcie and we headed out for our half marathon.

This was my third half and Alissa and Marcie’s first.  We picked the Violia Half because it gave us enough time to train, but also finished before our Africa trip.  After seeing the elevation map I was a little nervous and sent it to a runner friend who knows all about those kinds of things and he confirmed my suspicion of it being quite the hilly course.  Although after surveying my pictures it appears this is the flattest course ever!!!!!

As we drove into the tiniest, cutest town ever we all laughed.  The race topped off at about 300 people and was super sweet.  That’s really how I would describe it…small town sweet.

The actual course had hill after hill after hill, but was gorgeous.  I took so many pictures.  The weather was awesome…really overcast in the morning for a while, then some sun, then overcast, some shade spots here and there and then the sun came out for the last few miles.  Perfection.

At one point a tractor was making it’s way down the road with us.  I laughed out loud when I looked over my shoulder to see it tailing Marcie and Alissa.  A dog also spent some time with us.  He followed us for quite some time.  There were also cows and horses and old barns and flowers.

I loved how the course was marked with each mile.  Missed the mile one marker though.  Alas.

There were lots of water stations spread through out the course filled with friendly & encouraging people which was so nice.  They had water and gatorade, hard candy and orange slices.  Afterwards I hammered some BBQ sliders and RC Cola.  You read that correctly.

And no one died.  Despite some people thinking they might surely perish…not one of us did.  Everyone lived to tell about this super hilly 13.1 miles.  We even got a shirt and metal to prove it.

I ran my two other 1/2 marathons for time…alone…and after training with friends I don’t know if I’ll ever go back to running one for time because this was too much fun for me.  I really loved it and would love to do another one.  Now I just need to talk Marcie and Alissa…or other friends…into signing up for another one 🙂

Happy Tuesday.

1 Comment

  1. Jennifer says:

    Wow! It was a beautiful course. Congratulations on finishing! We definitely need to do one together. I’ve got my eye on the Hot Chocolate 15K in Dallas, February 4th! The swag is awesome not to mention the chocolate!!!!

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