Richmond Half Marathon!

Yesterday proved to be another great experience with Inclusive Racing.  This was Alex's fifth race, she's participated in two 5k's, an 8K, a 10K and now her first half marathon!!!

We started our day early at 4:30AM and headed downtown by 6AM.  And it was COLD!!!  We were a little concerned about Alex participating with the cold front that came in the night before and it was a cold, cold, 20 degrees when we left the house.  

We got to our meeting spot and met with Laura.  We have been wanting to run with Laura for a year now so we were thrilled that she was part of Team Alex!  She made these awesome signs for Alex's chair so people could cheer her on during the race!

We wanted Alex to stay as warm as she could for as long as she could so while we got everything straight she enjoyed the warmth of Daddy's truck!

Her tires were pumped and her chair prepped!

We got her bib number....

Fastened it to her blanket, bundled her up as much as possible and she was ready to roll!  

Meet Laura!!

...and the rest of the amazing team that is Team Alex!

Laura, Rob, Patrick and Liz!

We ran with Rob in the Monument Avenue 10K and we couldn't have been happier to have him part of her first half marathon!  He's an amazing runner that comes down from Northern Virginia and we knew she was in great hands!

 Alex was happy - and ready to run!

And these awesome ladies were ready to run too!

One minute warning and Alex was thinking it would be a good time to continually pull her boot off!  We did a double check that she was ready to go...

 ..and they were OFF!

Laura sent me this great shot of Alex and the elite runners running along side of her.

We left downtown and drove to Bryant Park to see them at the half way mark.  Although it was freezing, the fall backdrop was beautiful!

Here come the elite runners....

....and here comes Team Alex!

Look at all of that enthusiasm!

...and notice the missing boot! At mile 5 it was apparent it was futile to keep putting it on!

Zach was a real super trooper getting up at the crack of dawn and freezing to support his sister - he yelled the loudest for her as she was running past us.

The ONLY bad thing was that when we drove back downtown from the half way point there was no parking anywhere.  We wound up having to park miles away and just as we were approaching the route we saw Team Alex run right by us and we weren't at the bottom of the hill to see them cross the finish line :( 

Team Alex ran 13.1 miles in 1:55:56!

Laura was supposed to run the New York Marathon last month and had to defer for an injury.  The fact that she was able and willing to run the half  pushing Alex gives just a tiny glimpse of what kind of person she is.    I know I say this every race, but I really don't have words to thank these amazing people.  Every race I feel such an incredible amount of gratitude to these athletes.  To give so much of yourself both physically and emotionally so that my girl gets to have an opportunity she otherwise would not be able to experience is so humbling and it's just so hard to articulate my gratitude.  

Zach commented to me that he thought it was really cool that people sacrifice their time to run with people like sissy and that it's really neat that people would want to do that for her.  He said he really thinks people like that are special and that he was happy Alex had friends like that.  So thank you Team Alex for making that kind of impression on Zach.

When Alex first crossed the finish line she was a bit cranky - understandably so for a few reasons, but after a few minutes she brought the smiles back and I was able to get some pics of her sporting her medal!

We love the medal she received to add to her collection :) 

So thank you Inclusive Racing, thank you Laura, Rob, Patrick and Liz.  Thank you for letting us be part of Inclusive Racing and giving us and Alex the opportunity to do something so incredible. Thank you for making such a difference with what you do, we are truly grateful.