You can read Part One here.

So the race finally started for Kirsten and me and I really loved running through Seattle.  The weather was great and we didn’t get rained on AT ALL!

When we signed up for the race, we wanted to run the entire thing.  But as Kirsten was training, she injured her knee and wasn’t able to train that much.  Before the race, we decided that we’d run for one song and walk for one song.  We would alternate that for as long as possible and then walk.  Our only goal was to finish the race.

Kirsten is really excited about this Target opening downtown.

Because we waited for an hour in our corral before starting the race, we were in mile 2 when we took a bathroom break.

I usually don’t use the bathroom during a race, but because we decided to stop, I thought I’d go.  And now I will never use one again.  I almost threw up when I walked into the porta potty, wow.

Although, if you have to go, there were tons of porta potties along the route.

We kept running/walking and approached CenturyLink Field (that’s where we picked up our packets on Friday).

I was hoping we’d be able to stop by and pick up more free stuff.

And yes, I wore my shirt inside out because I didn’t want a giant turkey on my chest.  I’m cool like that.

I don’t really know where we went on this route, but there was a really steep hill.

It pretty much went straight up and straight down.  Scary steep.  And then we were on the water!

And another steep hill…

That led into a tunnel

It was a long tunnel, so I took picture of myself just in case I didn’t make it out.

I was happy to see the light and get back outside.

And then we saw CenturyLink Field again!

You can see that we’re about 9.3 miles into the race at this point (that’s a 15k sign in the picture) and we were going downhill.  What we didn’t know at this point, was that the last 2 miles was a gradual uphill.

But before we got to that, we went by Safeco Field!

And then we were on the home stretch…

That appeared to go for miles.

It almost made it worse to be able to see the people in front of us because it looked like they went on forever.

I tried to concentrate on the scenery so I didn’t try to throw myself into traffic.

And it was actually pretty gorgeous out there.

We entered one last tunnel…

Before getting to the finish!

And while it took us just about 3 hours and 20 minutes to complete the course, I had a great time and it was so fun to do this race with Kirsten!

Oh and it was totally worth it when we went to lunch at Talarico’s later that day.

I had a slice of margarita and a slice of Oglio d’Avio (goat cheese, garlic, arugula, mozzarella and marinara).  I ate them both and they were incredible.

Really, the only reason to walk (or run) that many miles is to eat a ton of food!  I’m going to start planning my after-the-Portland-Marathon-meal.  It’s going to be embarrassing and I can’t wait!