The first annual Anderson/Ankrum Half.

While visiting my family in Florida a few weeks ago, my brother-in-law challenged me to a race against my nieces. Both Reese and Sage just placed first in their age categories at a mile-long kids' run in Florida, and Todd bet that I could not beat their times on a one mile run. Since I knew he was probably right, I quickly declined his idea and instead confidently countered that I could beat him in a race. Considering neither of us had run since high school, I figured I definitely had a chance... 

After hours of joking and shit talking poolside at my uncle's, Todd and I returned home at 11 pm and threw on our running gear. We were racing. By the time our sneakers were tied, my sister had messaged the neighbors and set up our finish line table, complete with bottles of water, medals, and bagels. Spectators across the street sat outside in lawn chairs and our bibs were pinned on with care. Reese giggled as she watched her dad attempt to stretch, and I nervously paced and did jumping jacks in hopes of warming up before the run. And then we were off. About an eighth of a mile in we turned the street corner and heard more neighbors cheering us on. As if running wasn't already hard enough, we now were both hysterically laughing as friends screamed our bib numbers and encouraged us to keep going. By a quarter mile both Todd and I were in pretty bad shape, so we opted to cut our mile-long run down to a half. My sister ran ahead to get the finish line ready, and after four minutes and forty seconds we completed our first annual half (mile)! Todd came in first by a few feet, although I think I recovered a little faster than he did... he was a hot mess drinking Gatorade and gnawing on bagels for the rest of the evening. 

Our first annual half will go down as one of my favorite family memories. Let the training for next year's race begin!