2:15.29

5:45 am -- alarm goes off.
6 am -- trying to force myself to eat breakfast and stay awake. it's simply too early but food is necessary!
7:30 am -- standing in line at the port-a-loo, still not really awake and not fully aware of what's going on.
7:45 am -- we are directed towards our "pens" and we stand, in the fading rain, waiting with people dressed in various colored shirts and all conducting strange little routines (some serious, some not)
7:53 am -- singing "500 miles" at the top of our lungs, still standing in the middle of a "pen" in the middle of the street
8 am -- clock starts
8:05 am -- cross the start line, thus begins 13.1 miles of running!
10:20 am -- cross the finish line. thus ends 13.1 miles of "running"!

so. as i sit here with icy-hot burning / cooling my quads on a sunday night, thought i'd recount my half-marathon experience whilst it was still fresh on the mind and muscles. it was a perfect morning for it, about 12 degrees Celsius, overcast with a drizzle of rain right at the beginning but waaaaaaaaaay too early in the morning for me. the nice thing is, it was early enough where i don't remember much of the first 4 miles and it doesn't feel like i was running for over 2 hours today. so that's nice. however, i can't say that i'm inspired to do a full marathon. watching the elite runners in the race after us, running twice as fast as our pace, i really respect people who dedicate so much time and energy to training for distance running... i am not one of those people naturally, and it will take a lot of convincing and an amazing charitable cause to ever get me to run a marathon. i think if it was something you could just get up and do, it'd be fine. it really is all the training it takes to be able to run that distance and actually enjoy / survive it.
so i'm slightly pessimistic at the moment -- the last half of my half marathon was quite painful, to be honest... i had a massive side ache that wouldn't go away, and this weird bloated / overhydrated feeling those last 6 miles (maybe too much information for you, sorry :P ) and as soon as i finished, my quads seized on me and continue to be rock-solid unhappy bunnies... but saying all of that, the rest of me feels fine and my breathing / heart rate recovered quickly, which is a really good feeling..
knowing i can be pushed that far is also a good feeling... calling a 30 minute run a "short" run now, instead of a long run, is also a good feeling... icy hot on my quads is an AMAZING feeling! and knowing that i did this for a great charity with a fabulous team of girls is also amazing..
just don't think i'll be running a marathon anytime soon. :)