Helvetia Half Marathon Recap

Good morning! 

Yesterday Katie and I had an early wake up for the Helvetia Half Marathon.  It was our 2nd time running Helvetia and our 3rd half.  Katie and I both agree we love this race, mostly for the burgers at the end!  

I actually saw someone giving their burger voucher away, I don't think she really understood exactly why people run this particular half, ha!  We had decided going into the race that we were just going to run it easy, have a good time and devour our burgers the end!  

Stolen from Katie's Instagram.  I have no shame.  Obvi.

When I said this race had a lot of hills I wasn't joking, this race is basically just hills.  

Katie asked me at one point during our run what my current half marathon PR is and I gladly told her. I also told her at some point that when we get to the last mile we should push it just to finish the race strong.  We'll get back to the moral of that story in a bit.  We just took the race as a fun run, we stopped at every other aid station for water and chatted with a few other runners along the way.  It was warm and the sun was shinning but it wasn't miserable and I didn't walk up any of the hills, Katie wouldn't have let me anyway.  My splits are all over the place but I expected that with all of the ups and downs of the hills.  Did I mention there were a lot of hills?!  

My Splits: 

Mile 1 - 10:08

Miles 2 - 10:17

Mile 3 - 10:18

Mile 4 - 10:22

Mile 5 - 10:36

Mile 6 - 9:59

Mile 7 - 10:07

Mile 8 -10:05  

Mile 9 - 10:09

Mile 10 -10:20

 Mile 11 - 10:35

Mile 12 - 10:25

Mile 13 - 10:01

Average Pace : 10:15

Chip Time Finish : 2:14:04

 I somehow finished with another PR.  Remember when I told you how I would come back to that story, well here we go.  At mile 11 Katie pulls out her phone to look at her running app and see how we are doing.  She looks over at me and says "Dani we are at 2:11..." I look at her and say "UGH, Katie!  This was suppose to be fun!"  So I kicked it back up a notch so we could finish strong and I was able to knock almost 2 minutes off my last PR time.  You know what taste really good with an Helvetia Tavern burger?  A freaking new Half Marathon PR, that is what! :) I didn't really run any faster this race than the Rock and Roll last month but I also didn't stop and use a porta potty during this race so that saved me a couple minutes.  

We didn't mean to be twinsies!

I love so many things about this race, I even have a little love for the hills.  Something I think is really cool is that Paula Harkin of Run with Paula Events, Inc. actually runs the race too!  I saw her last year running it on the out and back portion and Katie and I saw her again this year at the same spot.  There is a gravel road section that nobody loves but honestly I think that is the only course complaint I hear others runners share.  Every time I felt I needed/wanted some water there was an aid station coming right up.  I love the finish coming into the Hillsboro Stadium and the fact that nobody is rushing you through the finishers chute.  There are lines for things like bananas, chocolate milk and bagels at the end but they move so fast you don't notice.  The line for the burgers is always moving and doesn't take us more than a few minutes to get our burger, toppings and find a spot to sit so we can eat.  I'll be registering for this one again, always a fun one!  

If you ran the Helvetia Half yesterday tell me about your experience!  

*I stole all of the pictures from Katie's instagram*