Quick recap! I’ve done the Go Half several times in the past, but this year I just hadn’t been getting in the long runs so I changed to the 7k, which was a new race.

I woke up and felt horrible (coughing, bloody nose) and it was cold outside but I’m tough and all so I headed downtown anyway. I parked in the same lot I always park in for these races, which ended up being further away from the end that I would have preferred. The 7K started near Market and 14th just like the other races, but then the course goes across the Eads Bridge to Illinois, through East St Louis, back over the MLK Bridge, and then ends with a WONDERFUL downhill to Laclede’s Landing, after which you can hop on the Metrolink back to the Civic Center stop, included with your race bib. What I wasn’t sure of is if I’d get in trouble going to the next stop (closer to my car) since the materials implied that it would both be okay and not be okay, so I got off and walked quite a ways. Anyway. The race?

Did I mention it was cold? And rain was predicted. I met up with my friend April who was running the marathon relay with some friends of hers.

(We took a great picture, but it’s upside down. I’m totally sick of this—if the iPhone can take pictures any direction why can’t I move them to be right-side up on my blog? I swear, it’s things like this that drive me totally bonkers!).

The race started in waves—the marathon, marathon relay, half marathon, and 7k runners were all together. I thought this was more fun since I’m slow and ended up near people the whole time which I’m sure I wouldn’t have been as much otherwise! The race was FUN. The new course (well, new last year, I think) was great, at least the first 7K of it, and I felt pretty good throughout (other than the whole, having a cold thing).

The finish was the best—you saw it coming back across the bridge! And then you ran downhill all the way. The only hard part was that the last part of the course was a brick (cobblestone?) road and I felt I needed to do some easy stepping. And I got a medal anyway, and only had to run, well, approximately 1:04:38 for me, which is really slow, but whatever. (Seriously, I need to just run faster, but it’s hard when you can’t breathe through your nose, so I’m going to accept it this time. And I’m faster than anybody NOT running, unless they are a speed walker or something…

Car selfie, post race. Woo hoo! And then I went home and took loads of cough medicine and did very little the rest of the day. I’m not entirely sure that running in the cold and wet was the best idea, but I’m not sure it wasn’t! I would do this race again though—it was a fun and unique course, and well run.