Army Run Half Marathon Recap

Hi friends! Hope you all had a wonderful evening :)

I finally conquered (most) of my growing mound of laundry, nothing like the sight of clothes on the drying rack to make you feel like you've had a productive night! 

Army Run Half Marathon Recap

I loved this race. The route was beautiful, the energy was amazing, and there were live bands playing the marching drums along the road which saved me since my ipod decided to break conveniently two days before the race. Sad trombone. BUT I honestly don't think that I will run another race with music again I know, wild.

I walked over from my apartment with a few friends that I was running with, and we watched as the 5km racers came in. Its the only race that I've heard of starting the shorter distances first.

Pre-race shot with everyone warming up behind us (Dannie, Jenny, Laura and I)

The starting line - with 10,000 people in front of it ;)

Me and my friend Jenny, pumped to get started!

Me, Dannie, Laura and Jenny

At the sound of the cannon (yes, cannon) the first corral is off!

We started by running past the Parliament, so beautiful

Heading out past the war museum to the parkway along the Ottawa river

Some action pics

Me and Laura, being sassy ;)

Look Mom, no music!

She makes it look so easy :)

I started off with a pretty easy pace since I hadn't really trained for this race and didn't want to injure myself, but at around this point I saw the 2:30 pace bunny go by me and decided to go ahead of my friendsies and pick it up a notch

Running back over from the Quebec side, a group of ladies behind me started chanting

"OH we're half way there, OH OH living on a prayer!"

Made my day :)

I loved how the route looped back on itself a lot, so you could see the faster runners ahead of you

This was definitely my favourite part of the course, going into the woodsy residential area

Some of the leaves were changing already!

Heading through downtown on the last 5 kilometers of the race, my legs started to feel a bit heavy

And then I saw this. Instantly revived!

I really picked up the pace on the last few kilometers around the canal, seeing the people coming up to the finish line across the water gave me another boost of energy!

Just as I was coming up to the finish, I heard the announcer say that a man was getting down on one knee to propose - and she said yes!! I obviously sprinted to the finish line to check it out.

It was beautiful.

I took a whole 8 minutes(!!) off of my Toronto half marathon from May.

My running GPS watch, and my friends, were always a bit off from the markers, so I might have actually done it faster if they had matched up ;)

The best part: cute army guys handing out the medals :)

I grabbed a foil wrap (it was dang cold out! It even rained on us a bit) and went back to the finish line to watch for my friend Dannie and Laura. 

Here they come, heading in for a strong finish!!

SO unbelievably proud of them, and especially Laura for finishing her first ever half!!!!

We rock!

So impressed with our dog tags, aka the COOLEST race medal ever

We did it! 

Army Run, I will definitely be back next year :)

Being the Army Run, there was a lot of army paraphernalia at the end of the run.

My friends have officially dubbed this #theannapose 

After our race, we met up with friends of ours who finished in 1:47 and 1:50 (!!!) and Jenny made it in 2:10 - so amazing!!! My goal for next year is to move to the next phase of racing and actually work on my timing, and not just surviving the distance ;)

Dannie and Laura, rocking the Anna pose ;)

I would definitely recommend this race for anyone! It is a gorgeous route, quite flat with only a few minor hills, and there are tons of inspirational people running with you in memory of their children or significant others who were lost while serving our country. I even saw a man with a tire on a rope tied to his back as he dragged it along (I was later told it is for his training before he goes to the south pole. Intense, much?) and another guy in full army get-up with a HUGE backpack that looked about 200lbs. For serious. 

Would I recommend running a half marathon out of the blue without really training for it? Not so much ;)

Question of the Day:

• Have you, or someone you know, run the Army Run? What did you think? Is it your favourite course?

Because its my fav now :)

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