LogYourRun

I got out of bed 90 minutes before the race started. Normally I am at the race plenty early, but I started off running late. I got dressed and scarfed down a quick breakfast of a Cliff bar, banana, and water before heading out. We had to take a shuttle bus from the parking area at the race finish to the race starting line. I got there about 30 minutes before race start and was standing around getting cold. I had chosen to wear a long sleeve tech shirt with a tattered long sleeve cotton t-shirt over it and shorts with calf sleeves. No gloves, no hat. The wind was blowing pretty well and there was no place to hide from it.

It was kind of a weird start. The starting timing mat was under a pretty tight arch. Only 2 runners could run through side by side. Considering there were about 1500 half marathoners I thought it was funny. My plan was to just run comfortably the entire race so I had lined up just in front of the 2:00 pace group. When we finally got moving I tried to keep my pace at 8:50 - 9:00. It took me a couple miles to finally warm up. At that point I was feeling good and settled into a pace between 8:20 and 8:40. I walked all the water stations and for a little while after. I was feeling really comfortable. At mile 5 it started to mist. At mile 8 it was raining. At that point the rain felt good. Kept me nice and cool. I kept thinking that I would drop off after mile 8, but I kept going strong. We were running on a bike path through the woods and I started to feel like a race car passing people (still going 8:20-8:30'ish). People would pass me during my water stop walk breaks, but I would gain on them after.

At mile 10 I was still feeling good. At this point I wanted to hold my pace until 11.5 miles and then bump up the pace a little. Unfortunately, the course got really tight at that point. Some places I couldn’t pass at all and most of the time I have to pass in the grass. With a mile to go I ramped up my pace to a 7:30. I was still feeling good. With about a quarter mile left my heart rate alarm went off. It was indicating the my HR was over 180. I didn’t feel like I was going to die any time soon so I kept pushing on, passing a lot of people. I passed one guy who was plodding along and could hear him jump on behind me. With about 200 yards to go I started sprinting. My HR alarm going off still. I felt like I passed 50 people in the 200 yards. I crossed the finish line and almost barreled into other finishers who pretty much stopped right after crossing. I felt like I was foaming at the mouth, but by the time I had grabbed my medal (I love medals) I felt okay again. Someone tapped me on the shoulder and when I looked over it was the guy who locked onto me at the end. He thanked me for the tow on that final kick. I thought that was kinda cool.

My time ended up being a 1:52.05 which I am very happy about. I haven’t been sore afterwards at all. I feel like I had really good pacing throughout the whole event. I enjoyed running and didn’t feel like I was in pain until the last half mile. I also love how I crossed the finish line blowing spittle with my HR up toward my max, but I was comfortable quickly afterwards. Based on my Garmin (which decided to work on that day) My HR maxed out at 186. I was gauging my max HR at 182 before this. I think this is a truer number now.

Anyway, after all is said and done I think I like the half marathon distance.