Race Reports/Encouragement/Kudos - 15 and 16 October

Big Vic

DIS Veteran
Joined
Oct 17, 2006
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2,269
Saturday, 15 Oct

15 - pensgirl10 (Jan) Buffalo Creek Half Marathon, Sarver, PA
15 - stitchfan18 () Kansas City 1/2 marathon

Sunday, 16 Oct

16 - cloudnut220 (Beth) Atlantic City Half Marathon, Atlantic City, NJ
16 – deleckidesign (Michelle)Detroit Free Press Half Marathon
16 - Dennyha (Denny) Columbus Half Marathon, Columbus, OH
16 – jeanigor ()Detroit Free Press Marathon
16 - DISaholic (Jeanne), jeanneg (Jeanne) Hershey Half Marathon
16 - RunRookie (Rick) Pumpkin Stampede 5K


:jumping1: GO! WISH Team GO! :jumping1:
 
I'm running the Leavenworth (WA) 1/2 marathon.
It should be very scenic with all the fall colors.
I'll send a report tomorrow when I'm done.
 
Good luck everyone! I know there are others not listed running the Hershey Half and the Baltimore Marathon.

And to those running the Freep.....see you at the finish line! I am handing out medals.

Maura
 
Good luck to everyone running tomorrow!

I got mixed up and thought my half was tomorrow. If I wasn't going with a friend who knew better, I might have missed it! Races don't usually make me nervous but I was this time, a little, because I had it in my head that I was running Sunday and...I don't know, I felt like something was wrong.

But I think it went okay. At the end I was focused and forgot to look at the time, as usual. But I am sure I beat my goal time and might have come close to my secret goal time that I didn't say out loud because I didn't want to end up looking like an idiot. :) Can't wait for the results to go up.

Outside of time, it was one of the worst races I've ever had. Lots of pain. My feet were really bad which is disappointing because I thought these new shoes would make a difference. On the other hand I probably picked it up just to try and get it over with. I have another race next Saturday which in hindsight might be a little soon.
 

Saw the results. I was aiming for 2:15 and ended up at 2:02:50. 9:23 pace which is exactly what I did in the 10k last month. Weird that I could maintain that pace when going over twice as far. This is weird too: I don't carry a watch so didn't know my time past mile 6, where my friend and I split up. We were at exactly one hour so 10:00/mile pace. I always knew I ran faster as a race went on but didn't think it was fast enough to lower my pace that much.

I'm hardly ever happy with my times but am very happy with this one. Now I'm sure I can get under 2:00.
 
Pensgirl, what a great race! Sometimes just letting it happen is the key (says the woman obsessing over paces and strategies for next week's race, lol). Congrats!
 
Saw the results. I was aiming for 2:15 and ended up at 2:02:50. 9:23 pace which is exactly what I did in the 10k last month. Weird that I could maintain that pace when going over twice as far. This is weird too: I don't carry a watch so didn't know my time past mile 6, where my friend and I split up. We were at exactly one hour so 10:00/mile pace. I always knew I ran faster as a race went on but didn't think it was fast enough to lower my pace that much.

I'm hardly ever happy with my times but am very happy with this one. Now I'm sure I can get under 2:00.

Excellent! Congratulations on an awesome finish! What a great improvement!
 
/
Thanks! Not paying too much attention to what I'm doing seems to work for me. :) My only strategy was to pass everyone who passed us in the first 6 miles. :) And I think I did.
 
Sunday was a new race location for me, and one that was only 15 minutes from my house! Always nice not to have to get up way early and then drive for over an hour to get to a race. :)

Once again, I picked a race with bad weather. I woke up with a cold only to find that it was raining outside and would likely continue to rain during the race. Oh well.. So I got my Zoot Compression pants, running shorts, two tech shirts, and my run club jacket and headed out. I wasn't thinking about running hard because of my stuffy nose/head; I just figured I would finish and wear the cool shirt afterwards!

I ran into two friends at the race from my church. A very nice surprise! Claire started running to lose weight and to 'follow my example' as she puts it. Her husband Bob is a runner and has been trying to get her to run for many years. So here they were, getting ready to tackle this trail run in Lippold Park, a nice limestone path through trees, prairie land, soccer fields, and corn.

I started out feeling really good. My legs and feet felt great (no hamstring twinges or anything) and after about 1/2 mile, my nose and head cleared up and I could breathe! I was running faster than I usually did but it did not feel labored so I kinda went with the 'feel of the run' rather than the pacing on my watch. I kept up that pace (which turned out to be around 10:00) and was just enjoying the landscape and the rhythm of my legs and lungs.

I was running alongside another woman for most of the race. I am not sure if she was pacing me or if I was pacing her, but it was working for us. We stayed together until the last 1/4 mile when she fell back. I finished the race still feeling good and no pain in the legs at all.

I did not catch the clock time because I was distracted by the cheering volunteers and one woman who wanted the bottom part of my bib to tear off. And then when I was walking my cooldown, I forgot to shut off the watch. So I had no idea what my finish time was!

After meeting up with Claire and Bob and getting some post-race fueling, I went home to shower, dress, and go to church. The rest of the day was relaxing and spent with the family. I kept checking the race web site but no results were posted until this morning (after my strength training workout).

My official chip time was 30:44! Now I know most of you guys and gals are way faster than that (I am still a newbie 'running padawan learner') but for me, this was pretty exciting. It is almost 3 minutes faster than my 5K time of 33:08 back on October 1st. I hadn't planned on shooting for a PR but things just felt right and it happened!

My full race report is on my blog but this pretty much covers it. :)

I cannot wait until November 5th when I run the Hot Chocolate 15K in Chicago with MotoMiker!! Hopefully we can pace each other (but he is faster than I am and I don't want to hold him back). We'll see! Either way, having my running partner there is a real bonus!

And I just found out that my trainer Meghan is also going to be running the race, as well as someone from my office. And, I have a bunch of other friends who are running the Hot Chocolate 5K (guess they will get their chocolate fondue before the rest of us).

So all in all, there should be a nice group of friends at the post-race festivities! That makes for the best race experience!
 
Saturday I ran the Leavenworth (WA) 1/2 marathon.
I had never run this before, but we happened to plan a mini-vacation for that weekend weekend so I decided to try it.
I was nervous because I heard that it was really hilly. But to my suprise it wasn't that way at all.

Thing I liked:
Not hilly
Scenic
Smaller croud of about 1,700
Nice tech shirt given at the end
The medal was also a bottle opener (not that I would ever use it that way and damage my precious medal)!

Things I didn't like:
Running on trails (I didn't train for that so I wasn't prepared)
Trying to avoid horse poop on the trails - it was everywhere!
Long stretches of road running
No entertainment along the route (I'm spoiled having done 2 Disney races and 3 Rock & Rolls)
Missing 0.8 miles of the course! The sent out a sorry e:mail today saying that the person did not show up that was supposed to be manning that part of the route, so most of the front of the pack missed that out and back. I knew there was something wrong when I came to mile marker 11 and my Garmon watch was only at 10.2 miles. Oh well. I couldn't do anything about it.

Even with all the things I didn't like, it was still a fun race.
I ran it in 1:47:14 and was 5th in my age group (they gave pint glasses out to the first 3, so I just missed it!). I was 316th overall.

And it was Octoberfest in Leavenworth so we had a lot of fun in town afterwards (with my family).

This was my 5th half marathon for the year.
My next one if the Tinkerbell, which I'm really looking forward to.
But before that I have lot of 5, 10 and 15K's to run.
I love doing races as it keeps me fit! :banana:

Good job to everyone else who ran this weekend!
 
Rick: so cool that you are inspiring others! Interesting to see that I'm not the only one who doesn't see the finish line clock. :)

Disfan: ouch, too bad about the missed mileage. Same thing happened this weekend at a race where someone I know was volunteering. I'm glad you enjoyed it anyway. Bottle opener = cool idea.
 
I did the Men's Health Urbanathlon in Chicago this past weekend. I haven't ever done a race with obstacles so I wasn't sure exactly how fast to go out. The 7th obstacle was a little over 400 stairs in Soldier Field and that is what worried me. I wasn't sure how much I had to keep in reserve for that obstacle which was about 8 miles into the 9.75 mile race.

I really liked it but there were some problems. First, they did the waves based on age and nothing else. There was a zero wave you had to qualify for and then they went men/women by ages. I started catching the previous wave (which went out 5 minutes before us) just after one mile and was passing people for the rest of the race. I had to literally stop and wait for about 30 seconds at the first obstacle area and once we got to the stadium I was stuck walking because of the backlog on some of the stairs. They really need to base the waves on pace and not age.

The weather was perfect and it was a new challenge which I'll probably do again at some point. I went out too slow and the wave issue cost me some time but it was fun. It took me 1:19:39 to do the 9.75 miles and 8 obstacle courses but I know I could have shaved about 8 to 10 minutes off of that with a better plan of attack and better wave set up.
 
pensgirl Congrats on a great finish. I always marvel at how I run in training and then how I run in a race. Sometimes, the speed just comes. Must be the thrill of the race and having lots of "rabbits" to follow. Sounds like a sub-2:00 is definitely in your future.

Rick That is an awesome time! You are really getting speedy!

Frank Sounds like it could be a fun race with a little tweaking. Your problem is that you are too speedy for the rest of the field! But I agree, doing the waves solely on age is not entirely smart. I watched all the waves of the Freep go off on Sunday, and it gave me a new appreciation for being in the right corral at the start--watching some people in front corrals walk from the start (!) and other clearly speedy people in back waves dodge and weave around other runner/walkers.

Maura

Disfan11 Trail races are a whole 'nother thing. Glad you enjoyed the race. You sure have had a busy year. Hope you get a chance for some nice recovery time.
 





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