Race Photo Commentary

Get ready friends, I have race photos to show from the Chicago Half Marathon.  Race photos are always the worst.  I'm very jealous of people who manage to look good (aka like they aren't suffering a slow, painful death) while they run because I have never been one of those people.  However, I actually think these ones are far better than any of my race photos in the past.  I did not buy the pictures, so we'll have to deal with the watermark on them unfortunately.  Marathon Foto took SO many pictures along this course - they seemed to be everywhere!  I picked a small sampling to provide some commentary on.

I close my eyes when I run:

I don't really close my eyes when I run (at least I don't think I do?).  I just look down the whole time.  I don't know why I do this, but I think I am really conscious of the surface I'm running on and don't want to trip.

My sparkly headband is so awesome:

As is the rest of my outfit.  And I guess sometimes I open my eyes and look around.  Anyways, I can't get over how much I'm in love with the headband and the tank top.  I'll try to stop talking about them so much.  I also really liked the compression socks.  I bought them the day before because I had a Fleet Feet gift card and heard that compression socks can help with recovery.  I had no intention of running in them until the morning of the race and I'm really glad I did.  And then I felt like a tool when we were at breakfast and I was still wearing them. (I did change out of all of my other sweaty clothes luckily though.)

I try out new ways of holding my iPod:

My iPod was in my sports bra, as I did in the North Shore Half Marathon also.  That was the first time I did it and it worked well, so I'll continue doing it for races.  I don't plan to run with the iPod in the Chicago Marathon, at least not for the first half.  But then I might have my mom give it to me for the 2nd half because that half is not as fun and I will need some serious Teenage Dream in my life at that point.  I don't know how the iPod is still functional though.  It has been through so many runs with me - either held in my hand, in it's arm band, or in my sports bra.  I might also try it in my SPI belt sometime.  But I think no matter what, it's going to get sweated on.

Sometimes I try to smile, but it's really really really forced at this point.  And I have really weird, very inward facing knees:

In high school, Catherine and I discovered that my knees point extremely far inward.  This definitely shows in my running form and I wish I could fix it, but that's just how they are I think (that picture doesn't even do it justice).  This might also be why I don't pick my knees up at all when I run.  So I think during the winter when I am confined to the treadmill I'm going to work on my running form.  I learned some good tips from Bart Yasso and a rep from Newton Running this past weekend that I will share in another post soon!

And then I can smile for real after I finish:

Woohoo!  Another half marathon done!  I've lost count, but probably somewhere around 10-ish...but I do a lot "bandit-style" too, just for training or to run with a friend.  I also realized that this was my first just kinda average half marathon.  I think all of my others have been either really strong under 1:40 or really no-training, just kind of run and see what happens and end up close to 2 hours.

Do you ever like how you look in race photos?

How do you hold your iPod while you run?