I ran SF: Nike Women’s 2013 San Francisco Half Marathon

I thought running 13.1 miles was impossible, and if it was accomplished, it was surely horrible. But the smile I had on my face for most of those miles (mile 12 the real exception) proves otherwise.

I chose the Nike Women’s SF half for my first because I knew it would be a full experience. Nike builds an entire community around the race. It was great to have a Facebook page where people asked all of the questions I had and to see some of the faces I would be lining up with. I also knew that if I was going to attempt the impossible, I was going to need a lot of support and distraction. Plus, 30,000 other women and men suffering the same fate (or worse, twice my fate) was plenty of misery loving company for me.

Over the entire weekend thousands of women descended on Union Square, and even though I live nearby, it still felt like we were all on some sort of weird girls weekend away. Everyone I met was friendly and excited to be doing the race. Even when we were all crowded around Nike’s San Francisco store trying to find our names on the window, people waited patiently in line and helped each other find their names.

When looking for my name I was incredibly thankful that 1. few Mandys decided to join me on this particular adventure,  2. my name was not a popular choice for expecting parents in the past 50 years or so, and 3. Nike was kind enough to keep the few of us where I could get a good picture.

Having never done a big race before I didn’t know what to expect at the start line. I definitely didn’t think it would be fun. My friend and I got to our corral about 30 minutes before the race was set to start at 6:30 a.m., and it took us 40 minutes after the official start to make it to the start line. But the entire wait was entertaining. People in the apartments on the streets we were on would hang out their windows and cheer us on (one guy actually made his dog dance for us and although it was funny, it severely embarrassed the dog). People crowded onto their fire escapes to watch us. And despite being in a HUGE crowd of people all waiting for the same thing, no one around me got impatient and the faint music we could hear from the starting line was all people needed to dance and keep warm.

Because of injuries and time constraints, my friend and I did not train like we had planned to and we really didn’t expect much out of ourselves. Our longest training run was a bit of a flop and we ended up walking about 50 percent of it. I think we both expected the race to follow a similar pattern, but when we were still running strong at mile 4, I think we both started to realize that we were going to make it and do way better than we expected.

The first few miles were by far my favorite. The race started in Union Square and went along the Embarcadero through Fisherman’s Wharf and the Presidio. The people along this portion were fun and kept the energy high. Two guys had signs about zombies and just kept screaming “THEY’RE BEHIND YOU!” which made mile 2 a lot more fun (they showed up again around mile 10 with a different sign and I couldn’t help myself from yelling “zombies!” at them).

By mile 8 we had only walked a few times up large hills and we were getting close to where my family was supposed to be waiting. After going up fairly continuous hills since mile 6, we were so happy to go downhill for a while. (I may have shouted “I love gravity!” when we finally crested the hill and got a few confused looks).

After the Presidio the race continued along the Great Highway for a while before breaking off into Golden Gate Park for a couple miles. This was by far the hardest part of the race for me. We could see the finish line when they made us cut over into the park. My knees were killing me from the last mile of downhill and all I wanted was to get some food and sit down. But the promise of free chocolate another mile away kept us moving through the park. Finally at mile 11.5 my friend and I gave in. Our knees and feet were on fire and we had to walk for a bit. We walked for a little less than a mile before exiting Golden Gate Park and making a dash for the finish line.

I was so tired by the time we got to the finish line that I didn’t pull out my phone and take any pictures of the madness, but it was insane. There were so many people crowded at the finish, and most of them wanted pictures with the firemen dressed in tuxedos that were handing out our finisher’s necklaces. Someone started the trend of asking the firemen to pick them up, and it turned into some weird “look at how big this fish I caught is” type photos with the firemen holding the women sideways, upside down, on their shoulders, etc. Their tuxedos must of been disgusting after holding sweaty women all day.

For those who don’t know, the finisher’s necklace for the Nike Women’s Series are serious. People will sell them on eBay for exorbitant amounts of money. Instead of getting a metal that you will hang on your wall, forget you have, or even lose on the way to the car, Nike partners with Tiffany & Co. to make a special necklace for everyone who finishes (I’m sure the guys who ran it loved it). This year’s looks pretty cool, and it’s something I will actually wear. Although personally I think next year they should just write “badass” on it and be done.