After tense negotiations with my wife following last years Fargo half marathon she reluctantly agreed to let me run the 13.1 miles again this year on one condition - I had to find a friend to run with the entire length of the race. For those who don't know the story of the 2008 marathon it basically entailed me hitting the wall at about mile 8 and refusing to stop. I suffered until mile 12, remember seeing the Fargodome and then woke up on my back at the medic tent in the dome. I took a fun filled ride to the ER and spent the night at Innovis Hospital a.k.a. the most expensive hotel room in Fargo. My poor wife had also just run 13.1 miles and had to spend a miserable day with me in the hospital.
Understandably she was less than thrilled when I wanted to run again this year. As luck would have it my friend Kelan Moser was training for his first half marathon and turned out to be a great running partner. The morning of the race arrived with gray skies and a temperature in the upper 30's - perfect for me to avoid heat stroke this year. Kelan and I settled into a nice 9 minute mile pace led by Pacer Jim who was a crazy marathoner with his hair dyed bright green so it was easier to follow him. At about mile 10 we were feeling pretty good so Kelan and I decided that we should try and get under 2 hours. We picked up the pace for the last 3 miles, suffered a little bit but managed to finish with smiles on our faces in just over 1 hour 58 minutes. Some of the highlights along the route included a real live Elvis impersonator singing along the side of the road and seeing the marathon leaders. The leaders were running in the opposite direction and were absolutely flying. All in all a great experience and very excited for next year.
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