Our First Half Marathon Experience...

The day started out like any other race that Jonathan has participated in...he had his normal pb, apple and english muffin breakfast, stretched, posed for pictures from his crazy wife, and ran a few practice laps. Jonathan had prepared, trained, and did everything necessary to get himself in tip-top shape for his first-ever marathon.
The morning was hot but bearable. It was going to be a grat race - the first-ever FA marathon had over 400 runners! We were all psyched for the pancake breakfast at the finish line!!
Carter, Lucy, his parents, and I all headed down to watch Jonathan take off! The buzzer sounded and off they went! Jonathan was off to a great start! He was on track to finish in 1:45 - about 8 minute/mile.
Carter and I headed off on the bike to "pace" Jonathan and get some "action" photos! We were with him for about a 1/4 of the race. Then he told me that I was bothering him (haha) so off we went and waited for him at the finish line! His finish was like no other finish...it ended with a bang! Him hitting the ground with my hand behind his head. Followed by at least 10 minutes of non-response time.
Poor Jonathan had severe heat exhaustion, dehydration with altered mental status...that was the discharge paperwork from the hospital. Also had suffered a case of Tachycardia, extremely fast heart rate, and it took a while for it to come back to normal along with his body temp. I knew something was wrong when I saw him coming down the last leg of the race. Most people sprint but he looked like an 80 year old man the way he was moving. I met him at the line and it wasn't long until he was down.
Thank the dear Lord that our friends were right there with us and helped find Sylvia and LaVerne and also took the kiddos for us during this whole ordeal. Jonathan was very lucky and gave us quite the scare but he is feeling much better!! I knew he was feeling better because on Sunday as I was mowing the lawn (you guys know how he is w/ his lawn!) and was told that my lines weren't straight!! We didn't need a 2nd ambulance ride on our bill but he was close to one after that statement! :)
Jonathan was happy to know that he crossed the line and accomplished his goal of finising in under 2 hours. His time was 1:52 so he did very well for not remembering the last 1/2 mile up until the ambulance pulled up to the hospital! He's already got the date on the calendar for next year's marathon...we'll see if his wife's nerves can handle this again!! :)