Running my First Half Marathon

Running is the best exercise.

Running is undeniably the most effective exercise that everybody can opt to. The only problem is people take this for granted or they do not actually realize the benefits of running.  Aside from being the best workout, it is also the cheapest. Heck, it is for free. The only thing you will invest on, is the running shoes, or if you have running shoes already but never used them for running, you're actually killing its purpose and spirit. So go ahead, lace 'em up, and you're good to go. 

If you are still lacking the motivation to start running, let me share my story and how I became obsessed to running. 

I decided to run my first half marathon.

To be honest with you,  the decision of running the half marathon was out of whim and it was not really planned. My best friend and I was hanging out in a coffee place, browsing the web while drinking our coffee. And suddenly, I bumped into the National Geographic Earth Day Run advertisement and I blurted out and telling her, "Check out this finisher shirt of Nat Geo Run" and she said, "Oh wow! Let's run the marathon." And little did we know, this was the beginning of our "many marathons" chapter in our lives. 

The day of the race.

As you all know, marathons usually start early in the morning. How early you say? So for those who do not have the slightest idea how races or marathons usually happen, let me paint the picture in your minds. 

Races usually happen very early in the morning but this depends on the distance of your race. So the longer the distance, the earlier the race will start.  In our case, Nat Geo Run started around 3am. Keep in mind that this is the start of the race, you have to be earlier than the gun start. So you have to be settled 30 minutes before the gun start. Not only that, based on our experience,  you have to expect that the venue where the starting point of the race will be crowded with so many people and that means looking for a car parking slot is so damn hard and that eats a lot of your time. You do not want to be the last one to start running or worse getting your face slapped with, "Sorry, starting point is already closed." 

So first tip, be the earliest bird of the early birds. Be at the race venue at least 30 minutes before the gun start, you don't have to worry because there are a lot of activities happening before the actual start of the marathon. It's actually really fun, try to picture out a festive event with booming speakers, jolly hosts, dancing search lights, and different booths offering different kinds of healthy products or goods. So that is how race events are usually organized. You can just chill in the venue, relax, and start stretching out before the gun start.

Shots fired.

There goes the gun start. Everybody is hollering, cheering, pumping up and off we go. In my mind, I am very happy and confident that I can win this half marathon. I ain't a quitter. There's nothing else that can stop me. And so, I ran my own pace, trying to overtake other chill runners and some runners who  started walking after probably a 400-meter mark. I don't blame them. It's their own pace. So no pressure. I only kept running and running and running. I had my wired earphones with me, and water bottle, and so I felt oblivious towards the world. 

Second tip that I can share is avoid the 1st stop of water station, people will definitely stop and crowd this area. So my friend and I decided to kept going and opted to stop at the 2nd water station. Anyway, you do not want to drink too much water, this will hurt your stomach. So I reached the 10 kilometers, half of my half marathon and I started to feel the weariness and pain in my feet. I was actually running hitting the ground using the balls of my feet. This is me a newbie in running. So I shake it off. I was mentally conditioning myself by thinking that I was a spring, bouncing off the ground and my pain is just a normal pain. No way that I will quit. Unless I faint of course (lol). But God was there and He was protecting me in overcoming my 1st half marathon. 

 

I can see the Finish line.

The last tip that I can give you is while we were running, my friend and I, decided to do the walk/run strategy. So you can have the conditioned breaks that you need and not fully exhausting yourself. So what we did is to do unbroken runs for 4 minutes and walk for 1 minute. And repeated that until we reached the finish line. Use your phones as alarms or if you have your smart watches like Garmin or Apple or etc., maximize them.

Wow! I can finally see the finish line. And the endorphins just came rushing down my body. I felt so happy and fulfilled that I was about to finish my first 21 kilometers. I was really smiling amid the painful and numb legs and feet that I am enduring. I remembered telling myself, "Finish Strong. You're almost there."

And so I did.

I told you this is the first of the many half marathons I did for 2019. I have ran a total of 91 kms in 2019 alone. And the story for the next marathon will be on my next blog. That is actually a funny funny story, it is how my friend and I decided to run a back-to-back half marathons. So watch out for my next blog and please follow me and comment down how your first marathon also went. Or if you are still lacking the motivation to run, let me know by typing it as a comment, I'd be so happy to help you. Thanks for reading my story. Bye for now.