Mini marathon???

When I ran a half marathon in Louisville, KY a few months ago (that's 13.1 miles, for the uninitiated), at the turn around the volunteer shouted "Turn around here for the mini marathon!" And I almost dotted his eye. Because there's nothing mini about running 13.1 miles.

It was technically my first 1/2, I ran a 20K last March. It seemed pretty daunting, 12.1 miles, but then when I got there I had a shock. It was actually 12.5 miles (stop laughing, who the fuck knows what a K is?). I was pretty pissed, I wanted to run an extra 8 minutes and just call it a half marathon.

Anyway the 20K was a trail run, in Mississippi, up and down and tall trees and through creeks. I felt like primitive warrior woman. I had grandiose thoughts, the first few miles anyway, along these lines: This feels great! My body was made to do this! I am so powerful! A few miles later, when my left buttock was really angry, and I had to go to the bathroom really bad only I was in the woods and those don't go together like you might think, I was just trying to distract myself from the punishment.

So when I started the half in Louisville, I had no delusions. Or would that be illusions? I told myself very firmly, there on the starting line, You will be ready for the finish line before you can see it. You don't hurt now, but you will on down the road.