Defeated by my IT band

For the past 3 months I have been training for a 1/2 marathon
Diligent with my runs throughout the week, and the long runs
And I completed a 10 mile race a few weeks ago at a better pace than ever before

Needless to say I felt as if I was ready for this race
I was excited

Saturday was the Capital City 1/2 marathon
it was a perfect day!
50 degrees in the morning, a slight breeze
every runners dream to set out to complete a long run

Well it all started out well
Started in my corral w/ Justin. [We joked around that we know know what a cow feels like prior to the slaughter house.. ]
Our group was called and we were off
I was in my groove, set my own pace, even through the grueling up hill initial 2.5 miles
I passed my mom and dad at mile marker 3
They asked where Justin was and I jokingly said behind me
And then right before I was about to see my grandparents at mile marker 5
My knee started throbbing on the outside, and Justin passed me

I pushed through the 5 mile marker because I told myself my grandparents didn't come out here to see me walk, they came out here to cheer me on for a RUN!
I passed them, and pushed to the next bathroom stop
[I realized that there was such thing as over hydrating and I NEEDED to stop!]
I waited for at least 10 minutes to use one of the 2 restrooms that they had at the 5.5 marker
[ummm hello, you have 12,000 people running a race, and you only have 2 porta johns during the race but you have 987386 at the start?! definitely was not happy about that!]
When I went to run again, my leg/knee had completely tightened up

My friends passed me and I told them that my knee hurt and Ashley told me it was my IT band [Iliotibial band] and it wasn't going to get any better
Great! I didn't train to quit.. I told myself I would power walk until I saw the next medic station

The next medic station wasn't until about the 7 mile marker
I was excited to see someone from the medical field
I asked the guy from the Red Cross, if there were any stretches I could do to help my pain
his response
"Not that I know of, are you used to running this much?"
[In my head I wanted to say, Yes, dip shit , sir, I didn't just wake up this morning and decide that it was nice out and I wanted to run 13.1 miles for the hell of it]
I responded "Yes" I'm sure he could tell I was annoyed
He then said, "well I really don't know what to tell you, but I can give you ice"
[Seriousy dude, you want to give me ice, do you not know i'm at mile marker 7 and I've got to get to 13.1, no thanks!]
I said, no thanks, gave him an evil look and proceeded to walk

I tried to push myself every now and then to run through intersections or when I thought maybe I could push through the pain
But it just wasn't going to happen

I watched the pace setters run by me. It was heart breaking to watch the 2 hr 30 min time run by me, that was ideally what I wanted to run the entire thing in
then the 2 hr 45 min sign

By this time, I knew how close I was to the end, there was a part of me that wanted to cut off the race track and head to the hospital that I work at to see if there were any physical therapist available that could help me [anything had to be better than mr. american red cross]
I decided to just push through it and finish, i didn't come out here to quit, even if i had to walk through the finish line

So i continued to walk, I walked about 8 miles
Not how I anticipated on finishing/completing the race

I finally finished the race, and found justin waiting for me
He did SO well, and I was so excited for him, but all I could do was cry
I was in so much pain from my leg, and I felt defeated, all I wanted to do was run the entire race, beat last years time, and prove to myself that i CAN complete an entire 1/2 marathon
but my body proved me wrong
I'm glad that I didn't give up and that i pushed through it, however, I felt defeated

People would ask me how the race went, and I said, well Justin did really well, and I got hurt, and left it at that
I just wanted to tell people that I ran it in under 2 hrs 30 minutes, but that wasn't the case

Yesterday in the office, my co-worker looked up my time, and when he told me that I finished in 2 hrs 52 min, I was pretty much shocked! Only because it was 4 minutes faster than last year [and last year I ran MUCH more of the race].

I feel slightly okay with the face that I had to walk the race, only because I did do what I set out to do initially - beat last years time!

I've learned a lot during this race, mainly I have to listen to my body, and know when to push it and when back off... no one knows your body like you do! Know whats best for you!

So now I'm working on stretches and rolling my IT band, and taking a week or two off before I get back into training for my next 1/2 in August! There are many more races to be run and I can't wait to get back out there and prove to myself that I am able to do this!!