prefer my half marathons in san francisco

My time was almost exactly the same at the one I ran in San Francisco. I ran 10:55 pace in SF and 10:56 in NYC. Despite the times being almost the same, the races couldn't have been more different.  

Training for this half marathon during the winter was rough. Waiting outside for an hour in 35 degree weather for the race to start was awful. I think my ankles froze up because at mile two my right ankle started aching and continued for the rest of the race. I never have ankle problems (it's fine a day later).

When I run, I like to listen to episodes of This American Life. The show is almost an hour long, so I use it as a time keeper. For some reason it stopped half way through and started over again. So I listened to the first thirty minutes of "My Experimental Phase" twice. And then it was accidentally on repeat mode (a setting put in place so the Ghostbuster Theme song could be played over and over for the boys enjoyment), it started over again. That's when I stopped running, walked to the side and fixed my iPhone.

Finally I got out of central Park at around mile 8. That was the highlight of the race. They closed off Seventh Ave. to all cars and I had the whole street to myself. It was a cool feeling to run smack dab between the huge buildings.

I was excited to get to Times Square because I knew Rob, the kids, the cousins were there to cheer me on. Unfortunately, they couldn't find me. They tried so hard! Rob and kids gave it another shot and ran to the subway to get to the finish line. They couldn't find me again. He felt bad. I felt bad that they had to wait outside freezing for nothing. When I finally met up with them at the end, they were tired. Owen wanted me to hold him. I did.

I'm in the lottery for the NYC Marathon. If I get in, I'm wearing bright orange pants and green shirt. And scheduling a day at a spa right after the race. Had I done those two simple steps, it would have completely changed the race for me.