today i ran half marathon #7! i went into this race with the intentions of going slow and getting a “personal worst” half marathon time. i wanted to enjoy this race, run with my friends, take lots of pics (most of which were pretty blurry – sorry!) and have LOTS of fun…. goal accomplished! i am really starting to like these no-pressure-run-for-fun races 
the san francisco marathon was my first full marathon last year, and this is the first time that i would be running on a course (or partial course) for the second time. it was really fun since i knew a lot of the logistics already and knew what to expect course wise… that being hills
my alarm went off at the way too early hour of 2:45am. this race has a really early start, plus we had to make the drive into the city, and always like to get to the start line early…. so early it was! the girls picked me up at 3:45 and we were in the city and parked just after 4:30.
we made our porta potty stops and before we knew it, it was time to go into our corral! they were checking every single bib number to make sure you were in this corral, luckily we had all changed to start together!
me and danica
accidentally-on-purpose opposite matching
tara was running the full marathon on her birthday!!
DARK at the start line
countdown…and we are off!
danica demonstrates her
we made it up to the bridge around mile 5/6 ish. they close off one side of it for the race which is awesome. the video is blurry but the flashing sign is saying “caution runners on bridge” or something like that.
foggy golden gate bridge
running on the bridge
before we knew it, we were like a half mile away! we saw the finish line and i heard kristin yell my name who was so awesome and out cheering for us. she got a great video of us all crossing the finish line i will post when i get it. we all crossed together!
official results: 13.1 miles/2:02:45/9:22 avg pace
(last year during the full marathon i ran the first half in 2:02:35 – ha! just missed it by 10 seconds!! grrr)
garmin results: 13.23 miles/2:02:46/9:16 avg pace
danica got the AWESOME california
dreamin series jacket and medal.
i need one of those!
i decided to not add on the extra couple miles at the end of this race… we had places to go and people to see and i was close enough to my weekly mileage goal anyways
total miles for the week: 53.4
we then drove and planted ourselves around mile 19ish of the full marathon. we ended up making perfect timing and got to see tara run by and sing her happy birthday!
happy birthday tara!
after we went and camped out along the embarcadero where the sun definitely came out. tara finished the full (i won’t spoil any results but she did awesome!) and we were waiting for the restaurant to open and we got to see julianne come through! she was an official pacer and pacing the 4:45 pace group. she looked awesome and we were all SO proud of her
julianne almost to the finish!
we spent the next couple hours in the brewery with a bunch of bloggers eating, drinking, celebrating and laughing… another VERY awesome day!
i will be posting more pics and videos as i get them throughout the week
CONGRATS to all the amazing racers out there today!
Those videos are great, and really capture the awesome time you guys had. congratulations to all!
Great race report, Aron! So fun seeing you today
looks like such a good time!! i bet running with danica and billy was a trip
you all look hardcore in your arm warmers!
congrats on your pw, a well-earned pw in my opinion
loved all the vids and pics!!
Sounds like a great day – congrats!
Great job!! Looks like fun!
What a fun race report. Thanks for sharing all the video and pictures!! How did you like the arm warmers?
Great job!
Awesome race report girl! Looks like you laides had an amazing time!!!
Can't wait to see more!! Great job girl!
I love the matching outfits and arm warmers! So cute! great job on the race. I wish I could go out to cali and run it!
What a great time, I love the videos! As we were driving thru SF on our way back to the airport last weekend I was thinking how fun (but tough) it would be to run in the city. Maybe next year I'll join you guys:)
How fun to read your race report! Except for the GG bridge, it sounds a lot like the second half Nike 26.2 when I ran it back in 2004 (they supposedly changed the course since then because people complained it was too hilly). I wish we did have a chance to go across the bridge, though.
Anyway, thanks for all the awesome pics and video. Glad you had a FUN race!!
What a great day! Glad you guys had so much fun! Ana-Maria
Great report, fun videos and pictures! Way to go on having fun out there. I loved the opening video of the starting line, my second favorite part of the marathon, so exciting!
Great report, sounds like it was a fun time with great people! Awesome!!
great race report. what an awesome experience! glad you got a medal too, totally would have been lame if you hadn't
LOVE this race report, that looks like such a fun race! Nice job on your time!!!
Loved the pictures and the videos Looks like you had a really awesome time!
nice race! looks like you all had a blast! don't you just love running races with friends
What a fun race! Congratulations all around!
Woooooooohooo!!! How freakin' exciting?? Love the little video's. The first one where you guys were about to start got me all hyped up and near tears. LOL I was so excited for you guys!!!!!!!!!!!
Yay for getting a medal and yay for having a GREAT time @ the marathon. It looks like it was an awesome run especially when crossing the golden gate bridge. Wow!!!!!
Sounds like you had a ton of fun, and I'm glad you still got your medal!
Great job! I agree… the race was beautiful! I finished, and that's all that matters!
The weather looked perfect, congratulations!
Aboslutely AWESEOME race recap! Thanks for all the pics and video's! I'm glad you had so much fun and such great company to run with! CONGRATS!
Your PW is still better than my PR of 2:09 so HA!! Good job. Looks like you all had a great time. Looks too cold for me though. Just walking through the city on Saturday night, I was almost crying. LOL Give me heat any day of the week.
Such a fun race report. Running across the bridge looks awesome, the hills not so much!! YOu are always so stinkin cute makes me wish I could run in those little shorts…nope I am all spandex..
Great job! You are a rock star! I'm SOOO glad I trained on so many hills!
Looks like you had a blast!
Great job! I love all the pictures and videos! Wish I could have been there!
Awesome report! Thanks for all the pictures and video, especially the rope-pull method for hills. If we had some here, I'd definitely give it a try, hahaha.
Great job and pace. Looks like a beautiful 1/2 marathon.
I WANT TO RUN WITH DANICA.
You guys ARE the best friends ever. Tara's birthday song was too cute.
So fun and I don't think I could be more jealous of that fog right now if I tried! Oh and I used to use the rope method on hills, lol. Great demo.
Great race report. Sounds like you really enjoyed it and had fun. And you did great, too!
That looks like a blast! I may have to sign up for a race and just have fun with it. Well done with the photos and videos.
Great job Aron! sounds like you had a fun race.
What a great course to run for fun instead of the pressure of time! Congrats on a solid day after a 2:45 a.m. wakeup!
Sounds like such a fantastic time! Great pics, video & report
CONGRATULATIONS to everyone!
Congrats on the finish! And cool race report! I love the videos!
So sad we didn't get to meet up, I would have loved to meet Danica, too! But if you look at my FB page with my pics, you can see I had quite the entourage with me! I promise, we will meet up for a good run together! Enjoy the week!
Great pictures AND report! I'll have to watch the videos when I get home
Way to go on the half – looks like you met all your goals! What a fun time.
What an awesome race report! I will link to yours in mine later since I took zero photos! I am glad you had such a great experience! I love how you and Danica are opposites down to the arm warmers! So cute! Thank you so much for the cheers on the course, too! It was great to see you!
What an awesome race report! I loved watching your videos, esp. the start. Makes me want to run a marathon someday!
I absolutely LOVE that you go me in there saying "we are the best friends EVER!" so our style
I'm so glad I was there to cheer you guys on and help out. It was strange not running, but I love being a spectator! Looooove all my girls!
KT
awwww……I love the video!!! Thank you SO much for everything this weekend I cannot tell you enough how much it meant to see you girls on the course and to celebrate afterwards!!!! love you!!!!
best. weekend. ever.
Its awesome that you were able to put those past races behind you and go run one just how you wanted to. BTW I love everyone's funky arm warmers!
ok now I totally want to do a race "for fun." I don't think I've ever said that before. Looks like a challenge, but definitely fun to run with people and just enjoy it. way to go. Plus your PW is still better than my PR.
I love this race report! It sounds like it was a fun run and the pics are great!!
Looks like a GREAT time! Congrats to everyone.
That's awesome! I love the pictures and videos!!! Makes me very excited to run the Nike Women's in October. I'm glad you had so much fun!!!
What a fun race report!
How fun! I need to run a race with a buddy like that!
Sounds like such a fun time! Great photos.
Omigosh, AWESOME report, Aron! I loved all of the photos and videos! Sounds like it was a FABULOUS time!
oh your pics make me excited to run in my arms sleeves. the bridge sounds great and I can't wait to run it some day
So awesome to finally meet (and run!) with you in person Aron. Had a blast running the half with you guys and definitely made the hills a little more bearable. Hope I can be there in person WHEN you finally BQ.
Thanks for sharing the great photos/videos – great race report!
Congrats on a finish!
Wow, SF is FOGGY. I've heard that it is, but I never knew how bad it was until your pics! (out of all of the places I've been, SF is not one of them)
The videos were a riot!
I'm SO impressed that you took pics, videos AND ran!! that course has a Lot of hillsssss – geeze! GREAT Race report
congrats on an awesome finish and enjoying the race (and post-race
) !!!
Great job. You are so good at writing race reports.
the views from the bridge are awesome! even though you can't really see anything it is so perfect to have fog just lingering over you like that…
relaxing, no pressure runs sound awesome.
It sounds like a really fun race with friends! It is good to have those kind of races too, eh?
you guys had so much fun! congrats!
WOW what a fun race!!!!!!!!!!!!! you did a great job and it looks like you had a great group to run with. love the accidentally on purpose matching!!! and all the pics!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for sharing! That was a fun race and fun race report. (I did the full marathon.) I loved Danica's "rope pull method" of running uphill.
Congratulations! What a fun race. You guys always have such a blast.
Aww looks like ya'll had an AWESOME time!!! You did great too! Loving you and Danica's matching outfits, I saw the twitter convo
love it!
Lauren
http://www.teamgiles.com
How fun! I HAVE to come to California and run a fun race with you ladies sometime! Maybe Bay to Breakers next year, haha. Oh, and I loved the "pull the rope" video. My cross country coach always told us to do that!