Race Reports/Enjcouragement/Kudos - November 16th

[Big Vic]

Sunday, November 16

San Antonio Rock 'n' Roll Marathon and 1/2 Marathon; San Antonio, TX

FULL: wfloyd (Bill); Half: escape (Susie), kareneast (Karen) and DH Space Ranger (John), Maherae (Anne) and DH (Bob), TEK224 (Terri), tiberius (Richard), WDWFAN9 (Pat) and DH (jims2cool), wtpclc (Carrie) and DH (Scott)


GO! WISH Team GO!

 

[princessrunner]

GO WISH TEAM!!!!

Show em how you rock n' roll!!!!!

 

[dsnyfan21]

WISHers ROCK and WISHers ROLL!!! ​

Have a great race everyone!!!!

 

[wtpclc]

WISHers ROCK and WISHers ROLL!!! ​

Have a great race everyone!!!!

Yeah. Just hoping I'm not the Roller this time.

Thanks everyone!

 

[goofyinohio]

Lets go WISH team. Make us all proud!

Can't wait to hear how this race goes.

 

[getnthinr]

Go WISHers GO

 

[Tiger Lily 03]

Go WISH Team! Have fun and come back to let us know all about the event.

 

[Kristi1357]

Have a blast in Texas, guys!

 

[CarolA]

Posting a quick report on the Zooma Atlanta Half Marathon. I signed up VERY late so it didn't make the offical calendar!

I really debated doing this race, it's the first year so there were no reports on how it was run etc. And then there is my training (or lack thereof). I figured out this morning I had put in exactly 7 miles in the past two weeks!

Anyway, I thought it would let me know how I was doing for Disney so I went and signed up. The Expo was pretty small, but I did get a nice deal on some clothing!

Race started at 7 AM this morning. Last night weather.com prediceted 28 degrees so I was more then a little worried (see my panic post on the board! ) It was actually 37 this morning! HEAT WAVE! Due to the weather I decided not to take the train, but to drive so that I could take all required stuff, dry stuff for after etc. Plus even though they SAID the shuttle would be running I wasn't sure and it's a long walk. (And this morning I saw what appeared to be all the shuttles PARKED!) I got there about 6:10 and just stayed in the car until about 6:30.

Start was fairly disorganized. There is both a 5K and the half. Everyone starts together and they made no effort to group us. When I first entered the start area I realized I was in FRONT I worked my way back, but....

There were suppose to be 1,600 registered. No gurantee that many showed up.

At about 2 miles or so there was a "loop" for the 5K. NO SIGNS telling you what to do and one woman near me nearly headed that way when she wanted to do the half. At about mile five I saw two poor women talking to the cops because they were confused. They thought they were running the 5K. They missed the "loop"


Course was very hilly, but this is Atlanta so what did I expect?

It was cold, but once I got going I took off my jacket, tied it around my waist and was fine. (I did have on a cotton T-shirt I donated to our homeless by dumping early)

The last few miles were ROUGH. IT spit rain and there was a HEADWIND! It was tough running since you felt like you were making NO progress against that wind!

I finished in around 2:42. (Forgot to turn off my timer) AND NO BLING!!! If you finished after 2:38 they "ran out" Luckily the bling was a necklace so I didn't have to look at lots of medals! However, I was VERY happy with my time!

I did get teary at the end. This was my first half and I DID IT!

There was suppose to be a free "spa" lunch and spa treatements at the end. The "spa" lunch looked SAD so I skipped it and there was a LONG line for spa stuff and I was cold and tired. I did get a bagel, water and bananna at the end. (No gatoraid or stuff like that at the end, but it was at two of the water stops)

Not sure I would recommend this race. Water stops and end were poorly staffed. (And of course they ran out of BLING!)

Thanks to everyone on here for thier support. I couldn't have done it without you!

 

[getnthinr]

Congratulations, Carol! Way to go on completing your first half -- and it looks like Disney is well within your grasp where -- hopefully -- they'll have PLENTY of BLING for you!

 

[DianeL]

Great race CarolA!!! That is an excellent time! Have a nice recovery and may you remaining training days be full of positiveness, course after that finishing time I'd have to bet you'll be walking on clouds for a more than a few of your training days

Sitting here on pins and needles waiting to hear from our San Antonio runners.

 

[Cruella de mom]

Hi All

CarolA - that race was more than a little hilly!!! some of those hills were brutal!

I ran it also. I have been sick and I had no business running today especially since it was so cold. You probably passed me along the course because I finished a couple minutes behind you.

Congrats on finishing your first half!! I promise that Disney will be 100% more fun! Plus, it will seem easy compared to what you did today.

I didn't get a necklace either, but I saw one and they are pretty enough.

Cecilia

 

[dsnyfan21]

Congrats Cecilia!!!! (bummer with the "no bling")

Tracy

 

[CarolA]

Hi All

CarolA - that race was more than a little hilly!!! some of those hills were brutal!

I ran it also. I have been sick and I had no business running today especially since it was so cold. You probably passed me along the course because I finished a couple minutes behind you.

Congrats on finishing your first half!! I promise that Disney will be 100% more fun! Plus, it will seem easy compared to what you did today.

I didn't get a necklace either, but I saw one and they are pretty enough.

Cecilia

Cecilia,

Wish I had known you were there. Since I didn't see it on the board I decided not to wear the WISH stuff. (Plus it's not long sleeve!)

They are SUPPOSE to mail us a necklace. I will probably follow up just because it's a lot of money for no bling and a sack lunch LOL! My saving grace on Disney Bling is that Randy is running it too. He will be done in an hour and a half or so. If they run out of bling, I am taking HIS! He is not thrilled with a Donald Medal anyway! LOL!

I did think "Disney will have entertainment" I was by myself for a long strech and could have used some music or CMs to cheer!

I did modify my Galloway Run/walk times to allow me to walk some of the hills. I had done some of them on my training so I KNEW they were bad.

I was thrilled with my time since it was WELL ahead of the sweepers. (Both here and at Disney) As I left I drove down the road and saw two women being followed by the "cone pick ups" That would make me SO nervous!

By the way, results are up here.

http://www.onlineraceresults.com/race/view_race.php?race_id=9777

 

[DianeL]

Cruella! Great job! I hope you are enjoying something comforting like a spot of tea or cocoa if the weather is still chilly there

Hope your feeling much improved ASAP!

 

[rosy1020]

CarolA - CONGRATS...that is an amazing time for your first half marathon! Way to go! And not only is the wind factor physically tiring, I usually find it mentally taxing as well. I actually found that my first half marathon was harder than doing the full marathon at Disney. Mostly because Disney is just so fun, exciting, and entertaining that I actually didn't feel much pain or discomfort until my race high wore off the day after. Keep up the great running!

 

[Kristi1357]

Way to go, Carol!

 

[Tiger Lily 03]

Congratulations Carol on your First Half Marathon!

Wow! you are fast too! Thanks for the report. Sorry about no bling. You certainly deserve it. WDW will be easy for you for sure.

Cecilia, good job!

Too bad you both missed each other.

 

[TXAng]

Carol – Congrats on finishing your first half! You did GREAT! Way to go!! Sorry it was disorganized – and no bling? Major bummer! I hope they get your bling to you quickly.

Cecilia – Congrats on your half!

Where are all of our SA runners? I'm looking forward to hearing about it!

 

[kareneast]

Woke up to a chilly 33*. Left the hotel at 6am for the race shuttle & arrived at the start area an hour later. Temps warmed up a little to a whopping 35* with frost on the grass. After standing in line on the cold grass for the port-o-potties we headed towards the corrals where we ran into Carrie, Scott, & Richard, then saw Pat, Jim, Anne, & Bob. Made it to our corral where we stood around freezing with everyone else. We didn’t pack for cold weather running so had on shorts & short sleeve shirts (which was good, since it did warm up later) We did have throw away shirts & thankfully they gave gloves in the goody bags. There were 33,000 people registered for the race so it was a slow process getting everyone over the start line. They released corrals one at a time with 90-120 seconds between corrals. It took us 45 min to cross the start. By this point my legs & toes where frozen. Thanks to being so cold, I needed a port-o-potty stop by about mile 1 but every time we passed port-o-potties there were long lines, so I didn’t want to stop. By mile 5 I couldn’t wait any longer, so got on a line. Up ‘til this point we were having a good race & were on pace for a 3 hour half marathon. On line we watched the minutes pass away. We ended up losing 9 min. My legs were cold again & really didn’t want to run anymore. I kind of felt defeated & like what was the point of pushing. I would never make up those 9 min so I might as well just slow down, relax, & enjoy the race. As my legs warmed back up, I decided it was time to switch to some new goals. I still had a shot at a PR & I could try to make it the entire race doing R2/W3 (which I had never done for an entire half before). I am happy to say I succeeded on both back-up goals. We did have to (at times) walk a bit longer for water stops but made up for it by doing a bunch of 3-5 min runs. And…..I PR’ed by 6 min finishing in 3:11:34. If I hadn’t had the 9 min potty stop, that would have been a 3:02. I am very happy knowing that a 3 hr Half is within my reach…..this was just not that race.

All in all it was a GREAT race
(I really enjoyed running past the Alamo)

in a beautiful city (especially the Riverwalk)

& we had the pleasure of spending the weekend with some terrific friends. We had a very enjoyable time with Pat, Jim, Anne, & Bob having dinner & seeing Spirit of the Marathon on Friday night and then doing some sightseeing on Saturday. It was great having dinner Sat night with Pat, Jim, Anne, Bob, Carrie, Scott, Bill, Diane (Bill’s aunt), and Rhonda & family. And equally great having a post race dinner with Pat, Jim, Anne, Bob, Carrie, Scott, Susie & Cindy (Susie’s friend).

Considering the size of the race & it being an inaugural event, I think they did a good job with it. At the start they had bananas and bottles of water & cytomax and at the finish was the biggest variety of food & drinks I have ever seen. The slow start was a bit hard, but I can understand it. A few things they can improve on are the very congested bag drop off & pick-up areas, and more port-o-potties on the course.

It was an awesome weekend spent with great friends!

And great bling!

I look forward to the next one!