This year I’m attempting to complete Brazen Racing’s Ultra Half Marathon challenge – complete five (out of 13) of their most challenging half marathons (some are dubbed “ultras” because they run longer than the standard 13.1 miles) – and receive bragging rights and a special Ultra Coaster for your trouble and effort.

On Saturday for the first time, I ran the Badger Cove Half Marathon in Livermore. Thankfully, Danny agreed to accompany me to spend the night nearer to Del Valle Regional Park. If we had not traveled closer, I would have had to leave San Francisco at 5:30am to get to the race by 7am.

The course – absolutely beautiful! Rolling green hills dotted with gorgeous gnarled oaks. The hills meant some hiking and hard climbs, but the downhills were lots of fun – and none seemed too steep for me – so I was able to make somewhat good time coming down.

The course had apparently changed this year, and included a particularly long uphill climb close to the start.

But I was happily distracted by the views and managed to chat up a few folks here and there, which helped me psychologically throughout the race, I think.

The photos below are not mine, but show you how pretty the course was – and these were not even taken at other truly beautiful points in the race. If I manage to run it again, I’ll be sure to get some additional shots.

Early morning. Thankfully the temps remained reasonable long enough to make running (and hiking the uphills) fairly pleasant. It started to become warm around 10am, and by then I was nearly close to finishing.

Glorious green!

And here I am, goofily coming into the finishing chute/ arch.

I was by no means fast, but somehow eked out an Age Group win. Somehow, the fast 40-44 year-old women were racing somewhere else that day…

As always, some good-looking schwag from my favourite racing company…

Edit, 18 April 2015: Some weeks later, I received my very first-ever #1 Age Group Award!