Monster Half Race Re-Cap

I did it!! I totally beat all the time goals I had set for myself and PR'd! Scroll down to the bottom if you want the details on splits & final time. Here's my race recap.

I so was not worried for this race. Usually I am kind of a basket case the night before a big race. I think I had trained harder & smarter for this race, though, so just didn't have the pre-race jitters I usually had. My night before the race was pretty typical. Had some carbs and laid out all my gear, like I usually.


Can you tell I like the color pink?

I had no trouble falling asleep. I was, however, awoken at 4 am by the sound of the wind rattling my windows. I told myself - don't freak out, you race is over 4 hours away, the winds will die down by then.

When my alarm went off at 6:45, the windows were still rattling and on weather.com it said winds were in the 10-15 mph range with 20 mph gust. Yah, not ideal running conditions.

So I decided that instead of wearing this:



I'd add a fleece to that and wear this (I had always planned to wear the hat, it just didn't make it into the first pic):


Turns out I totally underestimated how warm I'd get and totally overestimated how cold the wind would make me. I should have stuck with my original outfit. Lesson learned. Having that fleece was great when I was waiting around for the race to start, but about 1.5 miles into the run, I was HOT. So I wasted at least a minute taking the fleece off and moving my race number, garmin, and iPod from outside of the fleece. I had recently bought that fleece so I just couldn't stand the thought of throwing it away (most runners will wear a layer that they will throw away as they warm up during a run like this). So I tied it around my waist and carried on.

I lost quite a bit of time during that wardrobe rearrangement, so I kind of felt like I was behind the 8 ball very early. Thank God I had my trusty Garmin. I was able to make up for lost time pretty quickly, but my overall time could have been better if not for that wardrobe switcheroo.

The whole run went really well, though. I had some knee/hip pain around the middle but other than that, it was a pretty smooth run. I didn't realize how hilly it would be, so my glutes are definitely feeling it this afternoon!

Now for the data!!

Mile 1: 9:40
Mile 2: 10:24 (stupid wardrobe rearrangement)
Mile 3: 9:06 (ok, good, made up for lost time during this mile)
Mile 4: 9:17
Mile 5: 9:27
Mile 6: 9:31
Mile 7: 9:24
Mile 8: 9:05 (I saw all the runners from back from the out & back turnaround at this point so turned on some speed)
Mile 9: 9:14
Mile 10: 9:14
Mile 11: 9:18
Mile 12: 9:18
Mile 13: 9:02
The rest: 2:24 - (8:31 mi/min - was supposed to be .1 mi, according to my Garmin it was .28 mi)

Average pace: 9:22
Total time: 2:04:24

If you recall, my 'hard goal' from yesterday's post was 2:07 so I totally nailed it! I'm really proud of myself for achieving this goal. All that hard work totally paid off and I think I have more speeds in my legs than I thought.

That said, I might have pushed it a little too hard or something. I felt totally fine after the race but spent this afternoon with some pretty un-fun digestion issues. Not going to TMI you guys and get into that, but I have been pretty miserable and had to miss my friend's son's birthday party. :( I remember feeling like this after the half I did back in May of 2007, but I did not train for that (yes, I was an idiot), so I was not surprised when my body revolted the way it did. I shouldn't feel the way I do now. So maybe I didn't drink enough. Or maybe I didn't eat the right meal last night. Or maybe it was the post-run latte? Who knows. I guess I'll have to figure it out by trial and error. I'm already starting to feel better after downing some Gatorade and taking a little nap.

What's next? I'm not quite sure. There is a half in January, called the "Frozen Half" that I might do with some co-workers (my employer has a running club - how cool is that?). But I am kind of scared to think what the temps might be like in January in Minnesota. So I might take a break from training and focus on cross training and then will probably try to do a half in the spring - followed by a marathon in the fall. Which I will be running with some fellow bloggers (stay tuned for details on that!!)


So there you have it! I hope you are all having a safe and fun Halloween! Time to push some more liquids and watch a movie! Gosh I'm exciting, aren't I!!