20 : Half Marathon Recap - YOU ARE CAPABLE OF MORE!

I PR'd my half marathon (1:43:15)! Today we chat about pre-race fuel, th non-existent warm-up, the hamstring snap at 8.73 miles, and how I ran with a pacer who had never paced a race before. 

1st in my age group out of 25

2nd overall female out of 181

52nd overall runner out of 480 in the half marathon

MY APP SUBSCRIPTION - For the woman who wants to be strong, conditioned, and actually ✨look fit✨

Transcript

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1 hour 43 minutes 15 seconds was my final time for the half marathon that I ran this past Saturday. So that is a 7 minute 53 second mile pace and today I'm going to be walking you through start to finish what race day looked like and a little bit leading up to it because this race really was on a whim and I am so glad I did it because if you go back and listen to my Hyrux recap from Hyrux Houston, I just had such a bitter taste in my mouth for how that ended because I knew I was so primed and ready for that race and it just did not pan out. Every race doesn't pan out and this one did, and when I say it panned out, I signed up for this race eight days before because I just wanted to kind of redeem the training. I wanted to capitalize on the training. I was like, you know what? I've been running for several months now, not quite a year. Let's capitalize on this. And so I kind of signed up for a half marathon on a whim eight days before. And I'm so glad I did because I pushed myself really, I think, to not quite my max potential. Like we always, as soon as we cross the finish line, you're like, I could have given more. I even talk about that in my high rocks episode. But I am just really proud of this performance. So I'm gonna walk you through the days leading up to the race and then race day itself because at mile eight, with let's see, it was 8.73 miles. I thought I got shot in the back of the leg. I am not exaggerating. I thought I got shot in the back of the leg. So we're gonna talk through that. We're gonna talk through how I felt throughout the race, what I did leading up to it, and then what I did afterwards. I'm your host, Carly Kaikendal, and this is the Daily Penny, the podcast about building sickening consistency through everyday habits. Being occasionally great does not get you very far, but being consistently good is what moves the needle forward. Every time you follow through for a workout, a meal in motherhood, in your finances, in your business or in your life, you're putting another penny in the jar of the person you want to become. One penny doesn't feel like much, but those daily deposits compound over time. This show is about fitness, nutrition, motherhood, money, business, and the systems that actually hold your life together in the seasons when motivation is gone. Whether you're rebuilding habits, rebuilding confidence, or just simply trying not to quit that you're in the right place. Let's add another penny in the jar. The first day that I decided I was going to be a runner, it is edged in my brain. It was May 4th, 2025. I had finished my first high rocks race in Atlanta. That was the mixed doubles race where I was the weakest link ever. And so on May 4th, it was a Sunday afternoon. I can take myself back to that moment. I said, I'm going to become a runner. I am going to run four miles today, no matter how long it takes me. And I went out and I did it. And then I was sore for about three to four days after that. But that was my base. Like that was my starting point. And then I knew, okay, this is what I can do. Now let's see how I can improve on that. And the other day, I got a question in Instagram DMs, and someone was like, I know this sounds like a silly question, but how do you start running? And I was like, you need nothing. And then I was like, well, actually, you probably need some running shoes. You don't want to just absolutely kill your feet. But you just need running shoes and then a desire to go out and run. You we overthink so much. And I'm like, running is the lowest hanging fruit. It is the lowest actually walking is. But walking and running are the lowest hanging fruit to just simply get active. And I think that's why you see it a lot of people when they try to start to lose weight, you know, they think they need to do cardio and they're like, well, running is running, you know, like I don't have to, I don't have to think about it. But some people do overthink it. So I just want to encourage you, lace up your shoes and go tell yourself, I'm gonna go out and run two miles no matter how long it takes me. And then that is your starting point. Like, I'm not a running coach, but I also, you know, I've been running for several months now, and so I feel like I have a little bit of advice to give because I've dramatically improved over the course of the past year. I'm actually coming up on my running anniversary on May 4th, 2026, and I kind of want to celebrate somehow, but really like just set a pace or set a distance that you want to go hit. Lace up your shoes and go out and start running. No matter how long it takes you, even if you have to walk and run and do that in like intervals, just go out and start running, and then you know what your base is, and then next time run that same route, that same distance, and see if over time you can chip away at your mile splits. And then once you start chipping away at your mile splits, if you have a desire to add more miles, see if you can then run four and a half or five miles, just keep adding a little bit onto that over and over and over. That is really the only advice that I have to give. Like, yeah, you can get into the weeds of like prioritizing zone two and then doing threshold runs. I'm gonna be honest, I've never followed a running plan. And you would definitely become a better runner in a shorter period of time if you actually followed a program or a plan. But I was just running because I simply wanted to become a better runner, but strength was always going to be my base, and so I didn't have this strategic approach to it. I'm like, look, this is just something I enjoy that I want to get better at. And if you do something over and over and over, you're bound to get better at it. And that was literally my approach. And like I said, if you followed a program, you could get better in a shorter amount of time. But this is coming from someone who I would consider myself an amateur runner. That is the advice that I have. Don't do not overthink it, just go out and run. But today's episode is specifically about this half marathon. But I do think that so May 4th, it hasn't even been a year yet. You know, it's been a little over 11 months since I started running. And then I just beat like my marathon PR before this race was two hours and four minutes. And that was back in college when I was actively training for half marathons. Now, back then, clearly I did not have the grit that I do now. I have so much more grit and determination, and just you know, this is so cheesy, but you know, people are like, I got that dog in me. Like, I got that dog in me that I did not have in college. Like, I just had so much untapped potential. And I think I look back and I'm like, what was I doing? I had so much free time on my hands. I could have been legitimately good at running, but I was also just eating a ton of crap, and obviously diet plays into it. So my fastest marathon time before Saturday was like 204.09 or 204 or 5. I don't remember. It's been so many years now. And so I shaved over 20 minutes off my time. And the longest run that I did leading up to this race was eight miles, which I did last Saturday. So I signed up for this race on the Friday before. So eight days before the race, I was like, look, there's a half marathon coming up. I had just this void of, like I said, that the high rocks didn't go well. And I kind of on a whim just signed up for it. And then a few days later, I was like, oh crap, what have I done? Because I'm just imagining, Carly, you've run six miles consistently, but you're about to run over two times that. And in the fall, in the fall of 2025, some of you might remember this, but after my high rocks race that I raced with my friend Cruzy in Atlanta, we raced on October 31st. Immediately after that, I decided, like it was like one or two weeks later, I also felt that void from like I don't have anything to train for. And I tried to sign up for some half marathons locally, but they were like totally full. They didn't even allow you to sign up. And so I was like, I'm just gonna run a half marathon on my own. And so I just went to bed one Friday night and I was like, I'm waking up tomorrow and I'm running my own half marathon. So I had like a little water station set up at my car. I had me some nerd gummy clusters for like some intra-run carbs, and I went out and I ran 13.1 miles, and I was really happy with my performance then. And the crazy thing is, is that I've never I have not wanted to admit this, but remember the knee injury that I got like a few weeks after that. I am like 99% sure that the knee injury stemmed from me just on a whim running that half marathon back in the fall. Because the two days after that, I did not ever like vocalize this on social media or anywhere for people to document it. But I I was trying having a hard time walking down the stairs after I ran that half marathon, and like, yeah, my my pace was good, but I was paying the price because my body just was not used to running that long of a distance. And so here I am repeating that same behavior by signing up for this half marathon and thinking I'm gonna get a different result, which I did this time. I'm definitely not that beat up. But in the fall, after I did that, I had that knee injury and it it had me down for like a while, like I was going to PT. I actually went out on a run one Saturday and could not run because of the pain in my knee. And so I finally, you know, after going to PT, after doing some things at home, like mitigated that pain. It has been basically a non-issue up until this point. And then last Saturday I went out on that eight-mile run because I wanted to prove to myself, like when you're used to running a certain distance, you kind of in your mind have like this box where it's like, okay, this is the distance I run. And like if you tr if you even think about running beyond that, it's hard for your mind to kind of comprehend. And so I wanted to prove to myself, like, I wanted to get past the mental barrier of, hey, you can run further than six miles. And so last Saturday, which was exactly a week before this race, I was like, okay, I'm gonna run eight miles. You know, it's two miles longer than I normally do. And then I needed to kind of taper off, taper off from what, right? Like I had not even been training for this, but I needed to taper off from like my strength training and just my overall activity the days leading up to the race this past Saturday. And so I was like, okay, if I'm gonna do any form of a long distance, it needs to be this Saturday before the race so that I have time to kind of like recover and taper back. So last Saturday I went out for an eight-mile run. I think my pace was like$7.59 per mile. And I was like really, really proud of that. And I even said on Instagram, I do not see myself being able to keep this pace. Or I even think I said, I definitely won't be able to keep this pace on race day, but I'm really proud of this time that I ran this eight miles in. And lo and behold, I ran faster than that on race day because race day adrenaline takes over. So I did that eight mile run, and I that that night I was like, oh gosh, I'm starting to feel that twinge in my knee that I felt after I ran that half marathon in the fall on a whim when I then had all those that that knee pain for weeks after that. I think it was actually like over a month I had that knee pain that like really set me back. And so I started feeling that twinge and I'm like, oh no, no, no. And so then it was like okay for like one or two days, and then it kind of started picking up. And so I text my PT and I was like, look, I'm running a half marathon in four days. I need to come to you, or actually it was three days. I was like, I'm running a half marathon in three days, I need to come to you to get some kind of treatment. And so I ended up going to her on Thursday and Friday. So I went in on Thursday and she did dry needling like around my knee and then on my right calf. And then I went in the next day and she did like an ultrasound on my knee. Honestly, I should probably have texted her to get like info on how to even explain that. So I'm not going to because I don't want to speak incorrectly on that. But it's not like an ultrasound, like like a sonogram. It's not like that, but it's she got this tool and she got this gel and she kind of like rubbed it along my knee. I don't know. She said it was gonna help, and I trusted her, and it did because the knee, it really did feel better. Even when I went to bed Friday night, it did not feel 100%. When I woke up Saturday, like the day of the race, it felt okay, but it was like still kind of stiff, almost like you're recovering from some type of surgery and you just kind of feel stiff. So I woke up Saturday and I'm like, okay, the knee doesn't feel terrible, but it still didn't feel 100%. So I'm like praying, like doing my morning devotional. I'm like praying for my knee. And God's probably like, you're praying for, you're praying for me to sustain you for a race that you did not prepare for. I just know that he's probably thinking that. So the good thing is is that the knee was a non-issue. Or I I thought that, you know, during the race, I'm like, I'm imagining it's gonna start to not feel great. And then after the race, I will probably feel down for the count for a few days. But I was like, you know, when it comes to the actual race itself, I can power through a little bit of pain. But let me take you back to the week leading up to the race. So that Saturday I did a run, Sunday was a full rest day, and then Monday and Tuesday and Thursday, Friday for me are strength days. I always follow my app subscription. So I did those strength days, but I scaled back significantly. I did like three exercises each day. So glutes and hamstrings Monday, I just did the three progressive overload block exercises. Same thing for Tuesday's upper body push. And then Wednesday is a cardio day for me. And so I did like 20 easy minutes on the stairmaster, just trying to stay in routine. And then I walked on the treadmill for like 15 minutes. Thursday was another leg day. I just did three exercises, but very scaled back, less weight, longer rest periods. That was it. And I think I only did two rounds of those exercises. And then Friday for me was a full rest day. I just went to the gym and walked on the treadmill and stretched a lot. And then Saturday was obviously race day. So the morning of race day, uh, the race started at seven, and it was 30 minutes away from where we live. So I knew I wanted to be there by around six just to be able to, you know, get parked, get everything I need, get to the starting line, just make sure that I was there, you know, not getting stuck in traffic, not um not having a parking spot and things like that. So I wake I wake up at 4 a.m. on Saturday because I wanted enough time to eat like a normal breakfast and then also have like a little bit of a carb right like 30 minutes before the race. And I feel like I feel like the only race that has gone perfectly according to plan when it comes to the lead up was my Hyrux race in Houston, which obviously the performance side of things did not pan out, but my lead up, meaning tapering off all of my pre-work or sorry, or sorry, my pre-race carbs, my whole pre-race routine, it was like dialed in. And I feel like every other race, maybe my race with my friend Cruzie, I felt like that the lead up to that like was pretty good and normal, but like my solo race in Boston, that you know, my my pre-race fuel was not on point. So now let's talk about this race. I got up at four, ate a normal breakfast, and then got um in my race or did my devotional, got in my race day outfit, left the house at 5:30, and I get there like just right after six, and I did not have time. I say I did not have time. One thing about me is I will get up hours before I need to leave and somehow still be rushing out the door and not be fully ready. It's a it's a bad trait. So I get there and I still don't have any makeup on, and I have to look cute for race day. So I put my makeup on in the parking lot. It's like right after six. The race starts at seven, but I was able to get a parking spot, and so I park, put my makeup on, and I'm just like taking my time, putting my makeup on. And then it's like 6:30, and so I'm like, okay, I'm gonna leave all my stuff in here. I'm gonna go use the porter potty, and then I'm going to come back, you know, put my running belt on, put my sunglasses on, leave my jacket in here, and grab my banana. So I go to the porter potties, okay. This is a this is not a huge half marathon, but there are a ton of people there, and they only had six porta potties, and I was like, you've gotta be kidding me. And so I get in line and I'm like 20th in line, and I'm like, oh my goodness, I should have brought because I kind of had to walk like a quarter of a mile or longer to get to the porta-potty. And so I was like, okay, I should have definitely brought all that stuff with me instead of leaving it in the car because I had to wait in line like over 15 minutes to get to the bathroom. So now it is 10 minutes before they shoot the gun to start the race. And I finally finished at the porter potty after waiting in line forever. I have to jog to my car to get all of my race stuff, and then I just left my keys in my car. And so then I've already planned on like I should have already had my banana. And so I'm like, I'm carrying my banana with me and I'm jogging to the starting line. And so I make it there three minutes before they shoot the gun to start the race. And I told myself the night before, I'm like, okay, I do not think I can keep up an eight-minute pace for 13.1 miles. I don't. However, I am going to try to stay with the pacer that his goal was, you know, like one hour 45 minutes, which is an eight-minute mile. I'm gonna try to stay with him for as long as I can. And then if I need to taper back, that's totally fine. So that pacer was like quite a bit ahead of me, and you know, you don't want to just like fight your way through the crowds. And so I was like, okay, I can see him up there. I will, you know, just slowly chip away and catch up to him whenever the race starts. So the race starts, and it's at this park, and I did not realize because part of it was paved. Okay, I only ever run on pavement and sidewalks. And this race starts, and we are running on packed gravel. Okay, clearly I did not do my research. Y'all, I'm just doing this thing on a whim. And I was like, Are you kidding me? I had I have never in my life run on packed gravel. Now it wasn't loose gravel where I'm like, you know, not getting any traction and like twisting my ankle, but it was gravel, and I do not run on gravel, I do not run on dirt, I don't run trails, I run on sidewalks and I run on pavement. And this entire course was packed gravel. I was like, you gotta be kidding me. So we start out, and of course, you're gonna have your people that start out so hot, right out of the gate, that are like almost sprinting. And so I'm like, okay, the I'm not gonna let this mess with my mind because I know these people are gonna gas out. And so I just keep that 145 pacer like in my view, and I'm just like kind of passing a few people here and there. And I mean, at one point, I'm like pretty, I'm kind of trucking it. And I'm like, okay, Carly, if you don't catch him, just keep him in your line of sight and just make sure to try to stay about the same distance away from him. So I keep trying to chip away at getting to this 145 pacer, and I keep looking down at my watch and I'm like, this guy is running faster than an eight-minute mile. Like, for sure, he is running faster than an eight-minute mile. But I just kept him in my line of sight, and I was like, you know what, I I will at some point try and chip away. I don't think I caught up to this guy until like mile four. And I will say that I felt pretty good. Um, I think that I knew if I caught up to him and I just kind of got in that pack and kept my stride, it would be motivation to stick with that pace for as long as I could. So I finally caught up to that crowd. I was the only girl in that pack, which kind of felt good. I had no idea who was in front of me, didn't care, but I just knew okay, okay, I can stay with this pack. And when I did catch up to them at mile four, I felt like I kind of hit a second wind. You know how people say like that runner's high? I feel like I hit a second wind at mile four. So even though I felt like we were running significantly faster than an eight-minute mile, these were my mile splits for the first four miles. Mile one, 751, mile two, 751, mile three, 742, and then mile four, 752. But once I caught up to the pack of the 145 pacer guy, I noticed that, okay, yeah, our mile splits were very similar times, you know, just like with within 10 seconds of a difference between the mile splits. But the pace within that mile was all over the place. And it was like starting to piss me off. And this is where the competitor in me comes out because I was like, this guy is not a great pacer. Because at one point I was like, oh my gosh, like this is not as hard as I thought it was. Like, I can for sure keep this pace for several more miles. And I looked down at my watch and it said we were running. An 820 pace, and I was like, Wait, why are we going so slow? And then, like, 20 seconds later, the pacer just like takes off, and then we're running at like a 740 pace. And I'm like, What is going on? Like, this guy's supposed to be a pacer. I need him to basically be every single stride the same distance, every single stride. I'm not a runner, so I don't know all the terminology. But I was like, this guy needs to be more consistent. Like, I need my mile splits to be like within three seconds of each other. And even with it, like I said, even within the mile, he would like speed up really fast and then he would slow down, and then he would speed up really fast and then he would slow down. And it it was really messing with me, but I was like, whatever. He at least knows what he needs to be at. And so I'm still gonna stick with this 145 pacer. So then we hit it's it's a down and back. So at the six and a half mile marker, whatever it is, you do a complete turnaround and then you repeat the same course that you just ran. So mile five was 745 pace, mile six was 752 pace, mile seven was also a 752 pace. And then we get to mile eight, and I don't know what it was about mile eight, but I felt like I hit a wall. My legs started feeling like cinder blocks. My quads just, I don't know, they just felt so heavy. And part of me was like, oh gosh, maybe we should not have dry needled my quad the day prior because it just felt sore. But ultimately, I don't think that really impacted it that much. But my legs just felt so heavy at mile eight, and then, like I said, at 8.73 miles, I am not exaggerating. Okay, I'm still keeping up with this pacer, right? And the pack has kind of dwindled down. At mile eight point seven three, I felt like someone shot me in the back of the leg with a shotgun. I mean, I grabbed like it was like something just went pow. And I grabbed the back of my hamstring, and it was like it was like something that you see when an MLB baseball player is like sprinting to first, and then he like pulls a hammy and he's like grabbing the back of his leg and his leg like goes straight and he's kind of like limping. That is what it felt like, and it was like something just popped, and I was like, You have got to be kidding me. So I like grab the back of my leg, and then the pacer kind of starts to you know distance himself from me because of that, and then it that shotgun feeling hits again, and it does it four times. But I told myself, this is so painful. I mean, it was a re it was like a very sharp pain in my hamstring, and then it kind of started reverberating like from my right glute down into my right calf. And I told myself, if I stop running, like this is so painful, but if I stop running, I know I will not start back running again. Or I, you know, if that pacer gets super far in front of me, it will just take all the wind out of my sails, and then I cannot be left up to myself to keep that same pace. Like I need that guide, you know, I need that guide to hold me to that pace because I don't know that mentally I can force myself to keep that pace with my hamstring feeling this way. And so I just see that pacer get further and further and further ahead of me. And I'm just I just start deciding I don't know if I'm gonna be able to finish in 145. But I am so glad. And I know this race is not that serious. All this is just a hobby, but I swear to you that that God was just like, look, this is really painful, but I'm gonna sustain you. Like you were gonna make it through, just just keep going. Like you did not prepare for this race, like I told you. That I'm imagining this is what's God's what God is telling me, but I will sustain you and let this be a lesson for the future. And so I have that shotgun feeling through my hamstring, but it does like after about two miles after that. So at the at the 10 mile, 10 and a half mile mark, it becomes manageable again. But by this point, I mean the pacer, the 145 pacer is about 50 yards in front of me, which doesn't feel very far, but it is far when you have to not only keep that pace, but then start chipping away at that pace a little bit. So the splits don't necessarily show it except for maybe mile 10. So mile eight was a 751 pace, mile nine, 754, mile 10 was a 741 pace. So I think that's kind of where I chipped away the most because honestly, my legs went a little bit numb and the pain, it still hurt really bad, but it became manageable. And so, like I said, I hit a wall at eight miles, and then the hamstring thing happened at 8.73, and then at about 10 and a half, it became manageable and I chipped away and I made it back up to the 145 pacer in mile 10. And what's funny is that I had stuck with him, you know, for eight miles, or I caught up to him at mile four. So for four miles from mile four to mile eight, I had stuck with him in that pack, but then obviously they stopped seeing me because I fell behind. And then when I caught up at mile 10, he starts looking down at his watch like very um regularly because I think he was like, Am I going slower? Like, how did this girl catch up to me? And so then, of course, this pacer starts increasing his pace, and I'm like, what is this guy doing? Like he's now he keeps speeding up and slowing down all within the same mile, and it's driving me crazy. But I was like, whatever, maybe he knows what he's doing, but it just feels like we're kind of all over the place. So at that same time, there's this guy who's been with this pacer the whole time, and this guy's wearing like a purple running hat, and his pace is like very uh natural. I'm like, okay, this guy feels like he's a runner. Maybe he's helping this pacer keep his pace. I don't know. But purple hat guy was like my saving grace because he felt to me more consistent than our pacer was. So I was just like, okay, stay in stride with purple hat guy. Don't let this pacer, who felt like a little wild squirrel that was just all over the place, don't let him mess with your head. So finally at 10 miles, I told myself, okay, the pain is manageable. You can for sure keep this pace for the remainder of this half marathon. Like you can do it. There's only three miles left. You can absolutely do this. And I told myself, okay, you can keep this pace. But at mile 11, when you have two miles left, if you want to pick up the pace, allow yourself to do it then. Don't do it now. Keep yourself with this pacer because there were parts earlier on in the race where I was like, I can run faster than this. Like I know I can. But also, thank goodness, I was wise enough to know I do not run this distance regularly. I don't know when I'm gonna hit a wall. I don't know what my miles, what when what my legs are gonna feel like at mile nine, 10. So do not run faster than this 145 pacer, even if you stick with him the whole race, that's faster than you thought you were gonna finish anyway. So just stay with this pacer and at mile 11 with two miles left, if you feel like you can push more, allow yourself to do it because it's only two miles, and you know, that is more manageable than trying to push it, you know, mile four or five. And so I stay with the pacer, and then at mile 11, when I told myself, okay, you can push further if you feel like it here, my legs were like, You've got to be kidding me. Like, you think you can run faster than this after you've run 11 miles? That's a joke, right? And so I just stayed with the pacer, and then let's see, mile 11 was 756, mile 12 was 756, and then the final mile, mile 13, was 746. And here's the part that is the kicker is that at mile 12, the pacer, I think he just decided, okay, my 145 group has diminished because it was just me and Purple Hat that were like right behind this pacer. The other people, like the other guys who stuck with the pacer, had either started running faster or lagged behind. So me and Purple Hat were the only ones that were left right behind this pacer. Well, I think the pacer took that as his opportunity to just take off and run faster because he wanted to. So he finished the race in like 142 something, and he was the 145 pacer, but whatever. And so I crossed the finish line at 143.15. And I will be totally honest, never in a million years did I think I would be able to sustain a 753-minute mile pace for a half marathon. But I will say that the course that I run at my house, whenever I run each weekend, it has a significant more amount of hills than this course had. This was a relatively flat course, which sounds easy, but I also benefit from the downhill when I'm running on the weekends at my house. And so when you're running downhill, like, yeah, the impact of slowing yourself down is a lot of effort for the quads, but you're still not having to necessarily work on the like forward propulsion part of it. And when you're running a flat course, you are constantly working. Like there is no, okay, this is easy. My heart rate can recover. No, you're you're just working the whole time when it's a relatively flat course. So I don't know what's easier. I actually operate better on more of a rolling hills course because, you know, my legs power me through the uphill and then my heart rate recovers on the downhill. Like I said, I'm not a running coach. I don't know runner terminology, but I've just, you know, I'm an amateur and I've been running for 11 months, and this is the words that I use to describe my runs. But, you know, my legs power me on the uphills, my heart rate recovers on the downhills. Whereas for this entire race, it's it's like relatively flat. There were a few hills here and there. There was a slight grade from mile two to mile six until we turned around. And then obviously there was like a little bit of a downgrade on the way back. So it was relatively flat. And I really think training on the hills at my house really helped me develop the, you know, running on fatigued legs. And so that was something that I normally don't do, is I normally don't run on a relatively flat course. So I think that was working in my favor. I also think even though the pacer within the same mile was all over the place, he did keep me relatively consistent within, you know, a 12-second split for each mile, which is something that I normally wouldn't have done for myself. And so I did benefit from that as well. And another thing I forgot to mention, I can't believe I didn't put this at the proper time in this podcast episode. So whenever we did the turnaround, like I said, it is one way in, one way out. So when you do the turnaround, you see everyone else that is running behind you. And so when we did the turnaround, I just started, started running and I noticed I'm not seeing any females. And I was like, holy cow, am I in first place? Because I don't, you know, like when you when you hit the turnaround point, or sorry, before we hit the turnaround point, we started seeing all of you know the elite runners uh coming back our way because they had already hit the turnaround point, you know, a while ago. And I started seeing all these runners, and I'm like, okay, there's not a female. There's not a female in the front of the pack. I was like, I'm in first place right now. And so when we hit the turnaround mark, I was obviously confirmed that there were no other females before me. And so then after we hit the turnaround mark, I started seeing how far behind the next female was. And it was quite a while before I saw another female. But clearly my eyes missed this one girl because at it was the eight mile, it was as soon as I hit eight miles when I told you that my legs started feeling like cinder blocks, and then at 8.73, I got feel like I got shot in the back of the leg. She passed me at like mile nine. Or sorry, I think it was eight. It was right at eight, and then at mile nine, I could still see her, but I was like, there's no way I'm gonna catch up with her. And I was like, dang it, but I was like, where did she come from? Where did she come from? Because I mean, she zoomed by me, she was flying. I was like, you go girl, but I was like, dang it, I wanted to beat you too. I thought it would be so cool to get first place out of all females. So she took off, she took off, and then at mile nine, I couldn't really see her anymore. And I was like, okay, well, there goes my hopes of getting first place, but it never even crossed my mind that I was even gonna get in any top placement whatsoever. So when I crossed the finish line, I actually knew at that point that I came in second place because of, you know, it being a one-way in, one-way out race, I knew that she was the only other female in front of me. Now, obviously, there could have been females that started after me that, you know, when it comes to total elapsed time, finished before my time, but I felt like that just wasn't the case because they would have been up front with like a pacer. And so I felt really confident that I had finished in second place. And so I did. I finished in second place out of 181 females in the race. I finished first in my age group, which is ages 30 to 39, and there were 25 women in that age group. So I finished first out of 25. And then when it comes to overall, there were 480 people in the half marathon, and I finished 52 out of 480. So they also had a 10K and a 5K the same day. That's why the crowd was so big. So like the half marathoners started first and then the 10K and then the 5K. So it was a really big crowd, but the people that were doing just the half marathon was 480. So it was definitely a smaller race. I would not have finished um that high ranking if it were a bigger half marathon race. This is just a local race put on by our church. They have a college, and so the college um hosted the race. They do it every year. But it was so fun. I I felt like, like I said, never in a million years did I think I would perform that well on race day. But it just goes to show how consistently showing up. Like I did not start running until May 4th, 2025. But I have not missed a single week outside of one Saturday in the fall when I tried to take off on a run when I had that knee injury, and my body said, You absolutely cannot. I mean, it was stabbing pain. I could not continue the run. That is the only run I have missed every single week since May 4th, 2025. And that's the only long run I do, but it just goes to show that showing up consistently, and I know that this sounds like so kind of ick and cringe and cheesy, but truly, another penny in the jar has been my mentality. It it has just resonated so much for me, it just makes the most sense in my brain that when you show up and you make those daily or weekly deposits, it all compounds. It compounds over time. And that proved to be so true in this race is that all the running I've done since May 4th, 2025, led me up to that moment. And then also strength training, strength training and conditioning or cardio have like a symbiotic relationship. One of them feeds off the other, like they just work so beautifully well together. So I am so confident that the training program that I've been doing, you know, with me following my app workouts to strengthen my legs and obviously upper body too, but from the half marathon we're talking about legs, and then also just the running that I've been doing on the weekends and then the conditioning that I do on Wednesdays, it's allowed me to be like relatively decent at a lot of different things. And also I just love this exercise split so much, but I think we underestimate how one day really does add up over time. So I just want you to take away from this episode, like, yeah, this is kind of just a brain dump of me talking through the race, but I want you to remember I have not even been running for a full year, but I have been showing up consistently, week after week after week, and I shaved over 20 minutes off my half marathon PR time. And also back then I was 19 and 20 and 21 when I was running half marathons. Now I'm 34, two kids. Like it is not all over when you hit your 30s. It is not all over when you have kids. I promise, if you just show up consistently, like your fittest days are ahead of you. I feel like I'm kind of all over the place with the last minute details I'm thinking about as I'm wrapping up this podcast episode. But I talked about um the pre-race, how like the porter potty situation, there were only six, and there were so many people at this race, and it kind of like threw off my pre-race routine. So, because of the long lines, I did not even warm up. I'm not even kidding you. My warm-up for the race was my jog to the car to get my stuff because I was about to miss the starting shotgun or whatever. So I did not do any dynamic stretching. I did nothing but jog there and back. And that was my warm-up for this race, which is probably also another reason the hamstring snapped at 8.73 miles. So that did not go according to plan. And also I mentioned Purple Hat, how he and I were the ones that were keeping up with the 145 pacer. So Purple Hat actually finds me after the race, and he was just saying, you know, like, great job, like I was, you know, we were trying to keep up with each other the whole race. And without me even saying anything to Purple Hat, he was like, Yeah, I felt like that guy was kind of all over the place. And so I just asked him, like, oh, do you normally pace half marathons? And the pacer was like, No, man, this is my first one. And I told him, I said, You would have never guessed. I mean, this guy was all over the place. But I thought it was just funny that me and Purple Hat both felt the same way, that the guy was just sprinting and then he was slowing down. But you know what? We finished. And when it comes to how I am recovering, you better believe your girl's using some ice packs. I'm trying to get some good rest, I'm elevating these legs, and we will we will come back stronger. That's all for today. Thanks so much for tuning in to another episode of the Daily Penny Podcast. If you need a roadmap for your workout program, you know, you heard me talk about my training split. Currently, I'm following the app workouts, the Daily Penny Fitness subscription. It is my monthly app subscription. It's$19.99 per month. You get access to the split program, which has a home and gym version that is body part split workouts. We have four strength workouts and one conditioning workout each week. There's also the foundations program, which is a three-day full body strength program. If you're a runner and you primarily run but you want to incorporate strength, honestly, foundations is the best program for that because it is full body strength. So even if you're only strength training one or two or three days a week and then you want to run your other days, Foundations is the perfect program for that because you're hitting upper and lower body in the same workout. I'm gonna link to that app subscription in the show notes if that is something that you need as part of your regimen to both keep you consistent and also know that you are working towards having both a strong and conditioned body.