My First Half Marathon

So I did it! I was so nervous. The whole day before I was so emotional. I was scared, nervous, proud, and overwhelmed.
The day was fairly nice. It was sunny with some wind. I wore a tee shirt with a running jacket my grandma bought me. It had thumb holes those were fun to use. But when I left in the morning I wore my Columbia fleece just because I wanted to stay as warm as possible while I traveled on mass transit. I was perfectly dressed though. It was a miracle.
The morning of I had to take mass transit to the race. I cried to the taxi driver who took me to the train station. Haha. That poor man. He actually did a good job of calming me down.
A train and a subway later I was a little more relaxed but I did have a few cries that I had to hold back. I was such a mess. But once I got my race packet (number and shirt) I put on my sneakers and got ready, I definitely felt better.
Then my mom called. She's a former marathon runner so she's done this countless times. She was asking how I was and I started crying again so I hung up on her. Haha I checked my gear, went to the bathroom and walked towards the finish line. My shins have been bothering me a lot lately in the beginning of running so I decided to jog for a little bit before the start.

While I was at the starting line I was looking around. And I was the only one alone. Once the gun went off the slower people including me had to wait for everyone else to start moving.

Overall the run was good. I felt comfortable and relaxed. I saw my mom for the first time at mile 4. I heard her from about 200 feet away. Haha she has a very distinct shape. I knew instantly it was her. I almost said to the woman next to me "that's my mom!!!!" haha

The rest was a blur. The race had DJs allover the place and that was nice. There was a high school band. It was nice.

There were some problems starting at mile 7. There was a loop around a lake and there was some cars that were already parked there. And 2 cars were driving on the course. And if I'm paying $88 I better have security out there.

I finished with a time of 3:01:45. Haha pretty slow but I didn't stop once and that was my main goal.

And the main problem I had was after I finished (yay) my mom and 2 roommates who came all said we should go to the "beer garden" for my one free beer. And as soon as we walked in the receptionist said sorry the beer garden is closed. UNACCEPTABLE!!!!!!! But it's okay my mom drove us back to campus and we went to our local bar.

So moral of the story. Don't run the 13.1 series especially in Queens.