Portland...loooong fun run

I ran Portland with my daughter Katie after her friend backed out during training. A bit of history...Katie and I ran our first 5K together nearly 6 years ago. I was hooked! Katie ran with me occasionally over the years but never had her heart in it and never trained hard. She also battles with her weight, thyroid issues and she's a computer nerd...what can I say. All that changed in January. She worked hard to get her 5K time down significantly. She finally finished a half marathon without walking and was committed to finishing her first marathon. Her friend backed out of the marathon so I promised I'd run with her. She really struggled once her long runs got over 13 miles. She skimped a bit on mid-week runs but completed all her long runs but she really struggled through them. Once she accepted the fact that she needed to run/walk from the beginning she did better.

I wanted to encourage her but to be perfectly honest I was dreading this marathon. Based on her long runs I was expecting to have to drag her the last few miles and was expecting a 6:30-7:00 finish.

We had a blast! 6:13 and she finished with a smile on her face. It was a totally different experience for me compared to my competitive marathons. We enjoyed the fantastic views. We read all the signs. We chatted with other runners/walkers. We thanked the volunteers. We enjoyed the bands. I'm so glad I decided to support her!

We looked for Carleen on the out and back portion of the course but missed her.

Now...back to training for my competitive marathon.

Congratulations to you both. It should be a no-brainer to run with your daughter if the opportunity presents itself , I'm glad you did.

Congrats! Sounds like you had a good time.

Sorry that I missed you! I loved Portland. Such a nice city and we had a great time there.

I'm so glad that this ended positively - yeah! Congrats to you both on a fantastic mother-daughter experience. I will never get my daughter to run a marathon (we ran a 5K together once), so I am envious.

Good deal - a special memory for sure and a pat on the back for you - that was a nice thing to do and glad it was fun!