Amazing, simply amazing ….

I’ve returned from my trip to Allentown and my first appearance in the Runners World Half-Marathon. I’m satisfied with my time, although I don’t yet have the official results, my watch time was 1:48 and the clock time was 1:50. I imagine the chip time is somewhere in between that. I think I learned a few things about running these longer distances, and that is to keep the pace steady, it seems that based on my mile averages, I couldn’t sustain a single pace anywhere along the way, although I did finish well.
I thought it was cool that they had live bands along the course, and DJ’s as well, it was really wild the way this thing was setup.

Here are the milestones:

pre-race:
I used my first GU gel 15 minutes before the race, I think it helped me start well. I realized when I was standing in the mass of people awaiting the start that I didn’t use body-glide, and that my nipples were going to be torn apart because of it. They ended up bleeding badly by the end. The girl that sang the national anthem did a beautiful job, talk about a great way to get physched up for a race. The crowd started screaming at the end, and shortly thereafter, the music started playing, and then the gun to start the race ….

mile 1 – 8:45
This time was from the minute I passed the starting line, 1:40 later. There were alot of people to get through in the first mile. It didn’t help that the woman with the cell phone who just HAD to make her call got in my way. I just can’t imagine trying to make a call at this time. I really had to use the bathroom this mile since I didn’t want to wait to use the job-johnny due to the lines …

mile 2 – 9:01
At this point, I got into my pace a little better, although i was still struggling through the people. Great crowd support in this race, it really helped. It was still a bit brisk at this point, hadn’t warmed up much.

mile 3 – 8:30
I got bitten by the bathroom monster in this mile, I decided to stop at the water station and use one of the two job-johnnies (instead of pissing in a bush somewhere). I stood for 45 seconds waiting for one, then said the heck with it and got back to racing. It wasn’t worth waiting for plus the fact that a woman was in front of me. It was weird, this woman talked to me like she knew me, I think she mistook me for someone else she met at a hotel. Oh well, i’ll never see here again 🙂

mile 4 – 8:06
I made up the time I missed trying to use the bathroom, and the sun was shining bright, it was really warm by this point, we were in open-sunlight on an open-road heading down Martin Luther Kind Dr. Tons of people were on the sides of the roads. I keps with my hydration technique of taking both water and gatorade in order to stay hydrated.

mile 5 – 8:00
We completed the longest straightaway and got to the turnaround point, this was the first chance I got to see the leaders and the 1:30 pace team. I realized then how far back I was really was, although I remembered that I wasn’t here to win, just to compete and do the best I can (overall, just finish!). I passed the VP of my department, Tom Davis, who was running around a 2:00 pace. I yelled some inspiration to him and he did the same. It again makes you realize that regardless of our function in life, we are all people in the end. Had a bad experience at the water-table, got water dumped on me from a dude who cut me off … oh well, it felt good in the heat I guess. Crown support was still great, although I was starting to feel the effects of being tired. I was still maneuvering through people to get a better time. I did get one bit of encouragement and humor out of the fact I got a ’10’ on the Mrs. T Pierogies “Hot O-Meter” or something like that. Basically, it was a bunch of chicks rating guys as they went by … I guess I should be flattered …

mile 6 – 8:02
The race entered the Little Lehigh Parkway and had some hills as we entered, although the hills here are nothing like what I am used to, so it didn’t phase me. I used long strides on the hills to stay ahead (it pays to have long legs I guess!) The trail was well taken care of and running along the creek was pretty cool, nice course. I continued my regular hydration techniques, which seemed to be working. I was surprisingly not getting tired yet, a little worn, but not yet tired. I had to keep the pace, this was my fastest mile (since alot of it was downhill).

mile 7 – 8:05
This mile started off with a water-table, I took my second GU gel prior to the table so I can wash it down, I really needed it, i felt like I was running on empty even with the gatorade I was using. I made the mistake (I found out later) of grabbing a gel from the table to use further on down the road…. i’ll explain later. Still feeling strong.

mile 8 – 8:43
This was one of the coolest parts of the course, we crossed over the covered bridge, and it was here that I realized that I had been here before. back when I was a teenager, I had a girlfriend whose family brought us down on a day trip to this place, talk about a flash-back. We got our pictures taken after the bridge, and headed back downhill. It was funny that I almost stepped in horse-shit on the bridge, there was a big batch of it right in the middle. You would’ve though that someone would’ve cleaned that up, eh? I was starting to feel kind of tired at this point, the legs were getting a little sore and I could feel my right hamstring tightening up. I was starting to dehydrate, even though I had kept a pretty good pace of drinking water and gatorade. The problem was that it was getting warmer and warmer, I contimplated on whether to take my shirt off or not.

mile 9 – 8:30
Not too much to mention in this mile, i made alot of moves forward in this mile because there were hills, and the people who hadn’t trained well enough were feeling the effects of the long race. I actually grabbed a tissue at the water stop in this mile and attempted to blow my nose …. it didn’t work too well. My stamina is still strong, and although the legs were tired, they still had many miles left in them.

mile 10 – 8:10
It was about this point that I really wanted to shed my shirt, beacuse it was soaked, but I was struggling with sore legs and a hamstring that was starting to bother me as well as my left and right groin. In addition, my knees were getting a little stiff, so I left it on just to stay consistent. At this point, i was running on sheer adrenaline. I had to watch my speed since I didn’t want to blow the hamstring or groin. I was a little angry with a guy that I passed in this mile who was complaining about having a bad race because of the number of people in the race now. He said ‘he’ll never run this fucking race again’ … I don’t have any respect for someone like that, don’t blame your performance on other people, I did excellent in a race with the same amount of people. It shouldn’t matter. what a putz.

mile 11 – 8:08
Despite my attempts to slow down, I ran this mile a little faster than the last, and the hamstring and groin pain had subsided. It was still there slightly, but not bad. I made the fatal attempt at using the last gel I picked up at mile 7 just for an additional boost. I never looked to see what flavor it was, it turned out that I opened it up prior to the water stop, squeezed it in my mouth, and it was HONEY FLAVORED! BLAH! I almost puked instantly, but kept it down, I washed it down and tossed it like a 100 feet in disgust. The lesson here is NEVER trust gel’s on the course, you never know what you get. Regardless, I had to finish with this awful taste in my mouth since there were no more water stops anywhere.

mile 12 – 8:11
As we entered the park again, I knew we were coming close to the finish. My knees and hamstring were real sore at this point, and i was dehydrating, even though again, I had worked to stay as hydrated as possible. I was still passing people left and right as we got back on the final stretch. We passed some folks that had finished the race, and one guy states ‘you’re almost there, its all flat, almost, well, theres the one hill …’ and a girl just said, don’t say anything more … we didn’t need to hear that at this point, we were all struggling!

Mile 13 & FINISH – 8:40
Surprisingly, I picked up speed in the last mile, passing a ton of people as I headed into the stadium for the big finish. what a rush it is to hit the stadium and see the people cheering and know that you are so close to finishing something that you worked so hard for. I passed another 5-6 people on the track (nice track by the way), and headed for the finish. I about died when I crossed the finish line, I allowed a guy to go ahead of me and finish since I felt bad sprinting the way I was. We all worked hard, I shouldn’t take away someone elses’ moment like that, so I didn’t. My body really hurt when I stopped running, however I knew I still had to get back to the car, not to mention having to climb up the hill to get refreshments … (who set this place up!)

Things that I learned from this race:

1. TRUST YOUR TRAINING! I can’t emphasize this more. If you do the training, good things will come. I finished 12 minutes faster than i wanted to.

2. DON’T TAKE GELS FROM THE WATER STOPS! I paid the price when i really needed it. Bring your own on a fuel pack if you need to, but don’t trust what they have to offer. They mean well, but it can hurt you on a longer race.

3. USE BODY-GLIDE! My nipples will stress this to you everytime … (can nipples talk?)

4. LEARN TO PACE! My biggest issue in this race was that my pace was not consistent, I kept speeding up and slowing down. As I gear up for Steamtown this summer, I need to work on this, because I think if I keep my body at one running level, it will perform better. I’m not upset with my time, but I think pacing myself will make for a better race.

The next stop is the Fairfield Half-Maration on June 25th in Connecticut. Then ultimately Steamtown. I start formal training in 3 weeks for Steamtown, and i’m not really training for the next half, just using it as a training run instead ….