Ready or not. I'll go with not.

But tomorrow morning the half marathon will be here either way. It's supposed to rain, I've got a cold, I developed a blister on my toe doing a three mile run this week and I'm just altogether uninspired for this race. I've put in a few longer runs, but I've missed enough regularity in my workouts that I'm just not feeling confident. Also, I left myself in a bad place as far as goals. I kept saying I just want to get through it and feel better than last time. Well, that's just not a concrete enough goal for my uptight schedule-loving self. So I'm putting it out there today for 31+ weeks from now. My May half marathon goal is 2:11, 10 minute miles. Tomorrow I'll finish, maybe soaked, cold and cranky. I don't really care when I cross the line, I know I'll get there but I don't think it will be much fun.

On a much happier note, Hot Wheels was awesome in his first triathlon last weekend! He really enjoyed himself and already wants to do it again next year. He certainly wasn't the fastest one out there, but there were only six 6-year olds and his division was 6-8 year olds. Those 8 year olds are just so much more developed, it's not about the competition for the younger kids. Fortunately he didn't even care about who got trophies, he was a bit worried he wouldn't get one before the race. But once he crossed that finish line he just beamed for the rest of the day.

Here's his race report. We got there about 8:15 am and found an open transition spot near an edge, because parents weren't allowed in transition I at least wanted to be able to see and talk to him. Turns out other parents just ignored the rules completely, but we'd been through our transition practice so I knew he could do it. We went down to the beach for the start and the race directors were talking to the kids. Hot Wheels was off in space a bit and we had no idea whether he'd paid attention at all. They fired the gun and he stood there for a minute, then when the other kids hit the water, he ran in. He dropped and dog paddled pretty quickly, I thought he was going to walk until it was a bit deeper. The water did get deeper than his height, but he didn't seem to mind he really swam the whole way. There were lifeguards with floats and he stopped, along with most of the kids, to take a breather a few times. When he reached the shore I wondered whether he'd look around for all of us or stop. Nope, he was focused and determined. He motored up the really long run from the swim to transition area and he had a really quick transition to the bike. He had a volunteer assist him with clipping his bike helmet and then he was off on the two loop 0.75 mile course. He was nervous about stopping before the line from the bike-run transition, but he did manage to stop without falling. He had another volunteer help him unclip the helmet before heading out for the run. I couldn't see the whole 0.25 mile run course but he said there was a water station and he stopped for a drink. He was a little nervous when he couldn't find a garbage can so he stopped to ask the volunteer where to throw his cup. I thought that was cute. He was a little annoyed at all the littering until I told him that volunteers would clean up all the cups. He crossed the finish line and was ecstatic, the first thing he said was "Can I do it again next year?", then he said he was really tired. What a great event this was and we'll definitely be back again next year. I was just so proud of him, it was one of the most awesome things I've experienced.