Hills...sorta.

I am in the middle of half-marathon training for my next race...

Race day is April 28th and I will be traveling back to my old stomping grounds of Nashville for the event. I only lived there for 1 year post college, but Nashville holds a special place in my heart. It was where me and the hubby spent our first year of marriage together, and my stab at big city living which I always thought was going to be for me. Turns out, not so much, but I do have lots of fond memories from my time there.

I will be going to the race with a friend/former co-worker from my days as a retail pharmacist. I'm so excited to spend some time with her and to catch up on everything since it's been quite awhile since we've seen each other. Facebook is fabulous for reconnecting with friends and through our status updates we recognized that we both have a similar interest...running. Last fall we decided to schedule a spring race together and the result was the Nashville Half which is part of the Rock-n-Roll marathon series. Two of her running friends are also running in the race, and although I haven't ever met them I'm sure we will have a great weekend.

One thing I'm a little nervous about, however, is the course elevation.

The area that I run in is super flat. There is one vein that runs north of town that has some hills on it. I try and run that route at least once a week and I was proud of myself for incorporating it into my 7 mile run tonight. That is until I got home and looked at the elevation graph from my Garmin data.

Good news is that I kept a pretty consistent 9 min/mile pace despite the hills as you can see in the blue graph. Bad news is that my 'hills' are nothing compared to the ones I will face in Nashville. The change in elevation during the half-marathon course is > 200 ft., and my measly route of sorta hills only changes by about 50 ft. at best. I'm in serious trouble! I may have to take my running clothes with me to work on some days and do some after work runs there. There are definitely hills to be had in that area since it's on the river's edge. Plus, I remember all too well how the 10K hills there kicked my butt last July...right into the ER. I definitely want to be ready for inclines in the race this time around so I'm gonna have to find some real hills somewhere!