we got up this morning at 5:30...

... to be at the Chickamauga Battlefield Park by 7:00 a.m. Drove down to Ft. Oglethorpe in the dark, hoping to beat the crowd of several thousand people who would start showing up before daylight. Hoping we would not have to park blocks and blocks away for the race that started at 7:30. I can't remember my feets and fingertips ever being so cold. Due to sitting in the back seat on the way down there, I am  not sure what the temperature was, and don't really want to know - but do know it was cold with a capital C.

Amazing to see so many of the folk who were signed up for the marathon and half-marathon through the park standing around, stretching, hopping, in running shorts, thin T-shirts, totally inadequate clothing, while I was stomping my feet in wool sox, wearing five shirts, thinking my fingers in thick gloves might be frostbit. We walked over to the sign in tent, picked up race packet, and went back to sit in the warm car until time to get lined up for the race. After "America The Beautiful", and firing of cannon for starting by an unlikely little contingent of Civil War reenactors that had been camping in the middle of the parade ground, the hundreds of runners were off! Remarkably large crowd of crazy people out there in the cold, running for miles.

And the Absolutely Amazing time that our guy ran, finished the 13.1 mile Half Marathon: 1 hour, 56 minutes. I am pretty sure I could not have finished the course if given all day, and the park rangers would have been picking me up, completely exhausted, dragging my floppy, worn-out self out,  before they closed the gates when dusk was settling across the battlefield.

P. and I took a Chattooga County school bus/shuttle to watch our runner pass by, then jumped on the shuttle to forge ahead to the next intersection for more cheering of sweaty, panting runners. We made it back to the start/finish line about the same time as he did. And have been talking about the possibility of taking a nap the rest of the day. Now seems like a really good time to get started on that!