Hospital Hill 10k

This weekend my friend, Lori, and I drove up to KC to run in the Hospital Hill 10k. We met Julia-world's best running partner-who was running the half-marathon, for a good pre-race dinner at Sweet Tomatoes, which I ate too fast to get photos of the food, but I snapped a few shots of the excellent company.

Julia is awesome and picked up our bibs for us AND gave me the coolest gift ever, a badass bondi band, which did an excellent job holding my hair out of my face during the run. I'm a bondi-convert.

The race was fun. Traffic/parking were a pain, as usual, but we left early enough to find a spot and get to the start with 10 minutes to spare....but we didn't get a chance to meet up with Julia before the race. Lori waited in line for the porta-potty while I stepped into the sea of sweaty anxious runners. They announced that a record 7,000 runners had signed up for the race. At 7am it was already pretty hot and humid, which is typical for this time of year. This is a particularly hilly race, Lori joked they should call it Hospital HillS. I really don't know why so many runners sign up for crazy races in ridiculous weather, and I'm one of them!?
Last year I ran the half with Julia, but this year I wasn't really ready for that distance. Wedding planning and general laziness left me without much umph for training. This year it was really kind of relaxing to just have the 6 miles ahead of me. Yes, it was hot. Yes, there were still a handful of hills than make me angry and hulk out a little on the inside. BUT, I only have to put up with it for about an hour, and I still get a pretty sweet medal when it's over. I got to relax with a bagel from Panera while we waited to cheer Julia at the finish. I never once thought I was going to puke. I didn't go home and crash, worthless for the rest of the day.
There may be something TO this 10k....except that I felt a twinge of jealousy watching the runners finish their 13.1. I knew that I had that in me and was not really giving my all.
I came home and decided that after Lori and I complete our sprint triathalon in a few weeks, I'm going to actually start TRAINING for my next half-marathon in October. I'm going to work on my speed and actually follow a training plan, which I haven't done since my first half in January, 2010. I'm excited and will report back on occasion.