Me, my free beer and my free Koozie.
The day before the race, Christa and I hiked "The M," climbing over 1,230 ft in less than 3 miles.
From up here, you can see why they call it Big Sky Country.
It, too, was worth it.
I started the race on Sunday calm, cool and conservative, with the goal of running negative splits and getting anywhere close to sub 2:00:00.
The plan was not only worth it, it earned me a new personal record.
A personal record at 3,209 ft above sea level.
For a girl who runs at 0 ft above sea level, that's not too shabby at all.
I did not intend to PR. I did not intend to come close. My last few half marathons I've stopped short of reaching the time again--of course that came with the caveat of having stopped to help people on two separate courses. This time I beat it by twenty seconds. Twenty seconds is a good amount of time in running. I've got my sights set on more goals as I finish out this year.
Running Missoula was the arc of the most epic road trip of my life.
The week before was spent traveling from San Francisco, to Shasta, Bend, Oregon, Walla Walla, Washington and Glacier National Park. The week after was spent in Yellowstone and The Grand Tetons (let's not mention the stop in Elko, Nevada).
I want to thank my head cheerleader Christa for agreeing to sit in the car with me for two weeks so that I could run in Montana for less than two hours. She tried her best to find me a donut and Diet Coke, but when you start to run at 6:00 and take 1:52:51 to finish, open stores in downtown Missoula is hard to come by. She did manage to get me some donuts at the finish line festival...and I regret none of them.
Warno: She's a very loud cheerleader.
Also thanks to the fine folks at Run Wild Missoula for having Diet Coke at the finish line. An unexpected finish all around!
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