Yucky old rain

Yesterday was the Hills and Hollows 1/2 marathon in Valmeyer, Illinois. Valmeyer is about an hour from my home, and the race wasn't supposed to start until 8:00am, so I had plenty of rest before running yesterday. I managed to convince my friend Laura to run with me. She is also training for Chicago, but has skipped quite a few of her long runs due to having a long distance love interest who lives close enough to visit on the weekends. Due to this, she wasn't feeling too confident about Chicago, so I tried to convince her that it would be good to race a shorter race before the big one next month.
We met up about six o'clock to head over to the race. It's a good thing that we left a little extra time in our schedule, as once we got off the highway we made about three wrong turns. We arrived in Valmeyer about seven thirty, and of course at about seventy forty it started raining. It was just a light drizzle, so we weren't too concerned. We decided that we would head out and run two miles as a warmup, then run the race, and end with the last 2.9 miles after racing.
We were all lined up on the starting line when someone spotted a air to ground lightening strike...thus necessitating that we delay the start by twenty minutes, then twenty more minutes, then twenty more minutes. So we went ahead and ran the remainder of our mileage before the race started. I know, how smart are we if they're delaying the race, but we're still out there running in the nastiness? Scold me later.
Finally at quarter after nine they gave us the okay to run the race. There were only about fifty people running the half marathon, but there were probably another sixty or so running the 5k that started from the same point. My cousin's husband was running the 5k, and from what I saw, he did pretty well. The race benefits the volunteer fire department in this small town, and there is a traveling trophy that the first firefighter in each race gets to claim for his department. I haven't seen the actual results yet, but Joe may have actually won the 5k traveling trophy.
I ran a little slower than I ran last week, but the course was a lot tougher. The first four or so miles were gently rolling farmland, the middle fourish were flat Mississippi River bottom land, and the last third was straight uphill, including a two mile nonstop climb of almost five hundred feet at the very end. I managed to finish it in 2:09, which isn't too terrible, but is definitely not my best effort.
I'm still waiting on the official times, but if last year's finishing times are any indication of how this year's went, I still may have placed fairly high (or even won) my age bracket. I can't wait for everyone else's results to be posted...do it already dagnabit!