Madness

Hee Hee Hee! I won the Freescale Marathon this weekend. Ok, well actually, I didn't. In fact, I barely finished the half marathon before the winner of the full marathon. My time for the Half Marathon: 1:59:58. The winner of the full marathon: 2:13:43. Holy Smokes. This was a fantastic race for me. My conservative goal 2:10, I had a dream of finishing in under 2:00. Dreams can come true!

WARNING: Long post alert!

Summary: The Freescale Half Marathon was awesome. I hit all my goals and built up some good confidence toward BSLT. Stop here if don't need all the gory details.

Long Version for you gluttons for punishment:

The weekend started with my parents flying in on Friday night. It was great to have them here. I wish I could say it was to watch me run - but, alas, the grandson was number one on the bill for them. I took most of last week off from training so I would be well rested for the race. By Saturday morning I felt like a caged lion. I needed to get out and do something! Dad and I went down to the race expo to pick up my packet. The expo was awesome. I could have spent an entire day in there.

The expo was right across from ATC, so I managed to make a quick stop to check shoe prices. (BTW, I feel some big gear purchases this week. More to come...) That place is awesome too. Between the expo and ATC, I was energized by Saturday afternoon. By 2 PM, I had all my stuff laid out ready for my 4AM Sunday wakeup.

Saturday night we headed over to Party Pat's house for some pre-race lasagna. It was great. Pat and Jen are the greatest hosts. We had a ball. His buddy from college, Ryan, flew in from Chicago to run the marathon. We got to spend the evening getting to know him and his family. T spent the evening playing with their daughter Ellie.

I was awake before the alarm went off on Sunday morning. I jumped out of bed, started a big pot of coffee and started getting dressed. It was about 32*. We had light freezing rain for several hours overnight so everything was icy. Great. I left the house around 5:30. The Freescale parking lot is only about 15 minutes away, but I wanted to have plenty of time in case of ice. I got there by 5:45. Figures. By around 6:15, M had called and told me the race start had been pushed back to 7:30. I had time to kill. Luckily, I had to pee. Standing in the pee line is a great way to kill time.

By 7:15, I was standing in the chute ready to start. I had on my running hat, ear warmer, gloves, running shirt, long sleeve cotton shirt (for warmth), and running shorts. It was C-O-L-D, cold. Before I knew it we had already made it to the half-mile marker. It was really congested. People were trying to run around the walkers and strollers by running on the sidewalks. I saw at least 12 people slip and fall during the race. At the half mile marker, I saw the paramedics walking a woman back toward the start. Her head was bleeding. She had on a marathon bib. The guy in front of me made some comment about wasted training. It was a wake up call for me. I had to stay alert today. Mile 1 : 10:23, pretty slow. But, with all the traffic, not too bad. My HR stabilized and I got into a good cadence pretty quickly.

Miles 2,3,4, & 5 flew by. It was great having all the spectators out in the weather cheering us on. And, in true Austin style, live music along the course. Cool. Mile 6 - madness ensued. In a 1.5 mile stretch we had 1)the smell of Rudy's breakfast tacos 2)the smell of Krispy Kreme doughnuts 3)a guy in front of me with frozen hair (yes, frozen) 4)my first Shot Blok, which did not taste like a breakfast taco or a Krispy Kreme doughnut. It also did not thaw the guy in front of me. Between miles 7 & 8 we had a brief run into the northerly wind. Brrr. At mile 9, I checked my watch and saw that a sub 2 hour finish was in reach. I went for it and turned out sub 9 minute miles for the rest of the race. I rarely run 9 minute miles, so, this was a real event.

I negative split each mile for 13 miles with my fastest on mile 13 at 8:22 for an average 9:10 pace. I was amazed. Training does pay off. The chip folks had some kind of problem and didn't register the actual chip time properly so all my stuff is based on my watch. They recorded 2:08 and change for me. Turns out a bunch of people had problems with their chip times. Oh well.

I am still pretty sore. Looks like I need to do more training going fast. Luckily, I scheduled a massage for tonight. I spent a half-hour splayed out on a bed while some guy tried to get my legs to loosen up. It was exquisite agony. He suggested I come in on a monthly basis to get ready for BSLT. Another suggestion was to fill a bucket with ice and water, then stand in it and march in place for as long as I could stand. Whahuh? In what universe is this a good idea? Is this for real? Anyone? He claims it will improve circulation and speed micro-fiber healing. Yeah, I'm probably going to try it.

Anyway, it was an awesome way to spend the weekend. 10,000 crazy athletes running through the icy streets of Austin in 32* weather. I came away with more confidence for BSLT and a good solid beginning to the 2006 race season. You gotta love this.

See ya out there...