Horsetooth Half Marathon

I read about Horsetooth half marathon in one of my running magazines. It was listed as one of the most scenic half marathons, so I wanted to do it. Outside of Pikes Peak and New York, this is the race that I was most looking forward to. Girls on the Run also listed this race on their approved race calendar, so it worked out perfectly.

My husband mentioned that there was a big storm coming. When I asked him what day, he said Saturday and Sunday. I got a little worried because the race was on Sunday. The race organizers were very good at communicating and letting us know how they were going to deal with the storm. They told us that the race most likely would not get cancelled, but it could just start later in the morning or go on a different course. I REALLY did not want them to change the course because the course is what makes the race so beautiful.

There is a big element of challenge in this marathon because it goes uphill for almost 2 miles and then goes downhill with a few hills on the way down.

This is incredibly hard to pace, so I decided to leave my watch at home and just run this race by effort.

The night before the race, we had my daughter's 8th Birthday party and it was really hard to drive home. The roads were so slippery. I wondered if I could even drive to Fort Collins, which is about 87 miles away. People kept telling me that there was no way I could run this race in the conditions. But, I would be so regretful if I didn't at least try to get there and run it.

When I woke up, I checked my phone and there were no cancellations for this race, so I got in the car and backed out of the driveway. I got stuck at the bottom of the driveway. I put the car in neutral and got out and pushed. Then, I got back in the car and was able to drive. WooHoo! The roads in Castle Rock were pretty bad, but they cleared up as I got closer to Fort Collins. I got there just in time to go potty and get my bib and timing chip. They actually delayed the race by 20 minutes because so many people were still trying to park.

It was very pretty with all of the snow falling, but was pretty chilly. I wore gloves with hand warmers, 2 pairs of socks, 2 pairs of tights, 2 warm dry tech shirts, and a winter hat. Once I started running, I wasn't cold at all. The hills were no joke! My legs were burning so bad that I felt like stopping to walk. But, I knew if I walked, it would be hard to run again. After making it up Monster Mountain, I started going downhill and passing people. Then, another hill would come and people would pass me. At about mile 6, I started passing lots of people. I passed the 1:45 pace group and just kept running faster and faster. That was the point when I really started having fun. There were lots of kids that I gave high fives to. All of the spectators had huge smiles and made the race so fun.

I crossed the finish line in 1:41:11, which put my 5th out of 124 for my Age Group. Overall, out of all runners, I finished 103rd out of 1,324 runners. I ran a perfect negative split, getting faster at every mile. Not too bad! I will definitely do this race again!