Hello!  I’m still alive.  I’ve been sick lately and all my extra energy has been put into sleeping instead of working and/or blogging.  This past weekend I traveled to Washington DC for the very first time in my life.  I went with my mom because I raised money for Team Inspiration in the name of her. She’s my warrior!  I didn’t know until we were walking around that my mom had never been to Washington DC before either.  It was a special moment!

I was so excited to see everything but man there are many things to see there.  We kind of got overwhelmed!  We took a bus tour that took all around and you could hop on and off whenever you wanted.  I was still very sick when we left on Thursday morning, but I wasn’t going to let anything ruin this opportunity for either of us.  I put on my big girl pants and sucked it up as much as I could.

The first night we went to expo!  I think my mom had more fun there than I did. It was really exciting to see all the Marines there and talking to them.  They were thanking us for running in the name of all the fallen heroes and we were thanking them for their service.

So what did we decide to see?  I didn’t care too much about seeing everything but I knew I wanted to visit the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial and a few of the war memorials.  Getting to the White House was pretty much impossible for many reasons, but most importantly the President was on the move a lot when were there.  BTW: The White House isn’t very big.

This involved a lot of walking.  I was limited to how I felt and how much my mom was able to walk about the city.  But she did great!  I think she enjoyed me having the Fitbit so she could tell everyone how far she walked. We did get to tour the Capitol though which was really cool.  And they had the best gift shop.

The trip would have been different if Willie and I had went alone because we would have spent more time exploring the back alleys and finding good food!  My mom wanted to see the sights and this trip was about celebrating her and being another year cancer free!

Race morning was a little crazy!  This was the largest race I’ve ever ran so everything was on a massive level.  I was only three metro stops from the Pentagon, where the race started, but it took me an hour to get there.  And there was a lot of walking before the race actually started.  It was a little chilly too and I wasn’t feeling very well.  I went there to run the race so nothing was going to stop me.  Not even a little sinus infection and a fever, I just went after it.

When we got to the first water stop, I knew immediately this wasn’t going to be a race I was going to be able to run.  That kind of sucked because until I got sick I was ready for this race.  I trained for it and I was ready to tackle it. But I couldn’t really breathe in through my nose which left my mouth really dry and it was just really hard to keep up.  I knew I was going to have to take it easy.  That normal thing that clicked on inside of my head telling me to run just wasn’t there.  It never really hit into high gear.  At mile 6 I thought I was going to have to drop out but that idea never really stuck.  I was able to keep putting one foot in front of the other. The only thing I was worried about was beating the bridge by 1:00 pm because that meant I would finish the race.  Everyone who didn’t make it there in time would not be able to finish.  I hit mile 19 around 12:15 pm and from that point on it was just about finishing.

I really enjoyed looking at everything.  We started at the Pentagon, ran through Rosslyn, by the Potomac River, into downtown Washington DC passed the Washington Monument, Capital building and everything in between.  The crowd support was amazing.  The Marines were handing out water at every water station.  At mile 24, Dunkin Donuts gave out donut holes.  We finished the race in Arlington National Cemetary!  I was just a really great experience.  I was so glad to finish.

I finished the race in 5:45:59! It was tough not only because I was sick but the course is a booger! I wasn’t really expecting it to be so hilly. I definitely didn’t expect it to be so windy! I couldn’t imagine running my first marathon on that course but there were tons of people who did. I really wanted to bust out a PR for this race but it just wasn’t going to happen. I’ll have to try that in another race. But I was truly blessed and thankful to be running this race with Team Inspiration! Those were some of the greatest people I’ve ever met and I hate I couldn’t make it back to the tent to take a picture with them when I was done!

And for all the fallen heroes…Thank you for your service to our great country!

This was a dream race for me and that’s all I can say.  It was the greatest thing.  I crossed that finish line and I was content.  Time didn’t matter, it was just about making it to the end.