Graz Marathon

Today was my very first half marathon! I have been training for about 3 weeks just about every day. I never really did any running back in Little Rock because I didn’t have the proper shoes and the weather is very hot in the summer. However, here I started running and I truly enjoy it.

Anyways, I woke up fairly early this morning and my host dad and I ate breakfast together. A neighbor in Knittelfeld and his wife picked us up and the 4 of us drove down to Graz. I got my bag full of advertisements, a tshirt, water, my race number, and a sensor to put on my shoe that would automatically send data to a computer that tracked my progress and splits during the marathon. We turned our things in for safekeeping and jogged a bit through the Graz city park to warm up a bit, and I met Crash there! The odds of seeing each other there were pretty slim with 10,187 other runners, but I was super glad to see him! We talked a bunch about school and the race ahead. He was doing his first full marathon, but we decided to start out alongside each other. The race began at 10:00 and the start was crazy! So many people at once and it took a while to thin out the streets. Crash and I set into a pretty comfortable pace talking a lot and enjoying the atmosphere! The kilometers flew by and before I knew it we were already 10km in, and at that time I plugged in my iPod and began a steady run.  I said tschüss to Crash and went on my own from there. I tried to keep up a solid fast tempo, and the music really helped keep me motivated. Exhaustion came and went but eventually the last few kilometers came. I passed by my host mom and sister at the Graz Hauptplatz and sprinted to the finish. I just missed getting in under 2 hours, but with a time of 2:00:08, I was still very pleased with it, especially considering I only trained for 3 weeks. Also, I was the fastest American in the half marathon! Represent! I was tired and sweaty, but finished! I turned in my sensor and waited on my host dad and his friends in the city park. I took off my shoes and found 3 pretty bad blisters but other than that I felt great. We walked a bit more and I got some hot soup and bread to get some energy back into me. I also went to the First Aid Tent to get my blister treated (I had it easy…other people in there suffered heart attacks and severe dehydration).

Worst blister I've ever seen...

 We eventually met up with Justine and Julia again and went to eat something. My stomach couldn’t take anything but sips of water, so I rested up in the meantime. After that we headed back to Knittelfeld.

My number and medal!

It was a fantastic day. Certainly one of the highlights of the year so far, and I want to run another one in Vienna in April! But probably not as fast as the Kenyans who finished the full marathon in the same time I did the half. But we’ll see…