General Update / Carrabba's Half Marathon Race Report

So where have I been?

Well, I was in Atlanta, Georgia (actually Alpharetta) from Tuesday through Friday, San Antonio on Saturday morning, home Saturday afternoon through Sunday evening and I flew back to Vancouver, British Columbia very early this morning.

So how much did I run last week after the back-to-back 12K and half marathon in Tacoma and Port Angeles, Washington, respectively?

Unfortunately, nothing. I went to the gym Friday evening after I flew back in from Atlanta and got 5.13 miles in an hour on the elliptical machine (level 16) and another 40 minutes on the stationery bike. I did so to sort of kick-start the system.

Then I did something that I shouldn't have, but I did it anyways. Good reasoning never stopped me from doing anything.

I drove to San Antonio - getting up at 3 a.m. to leave 45 minutes later - to run in the Carrabba's Classic Half Marathon at McAllister Park. This is an event that I've participated in the last two years that is put on by the San Antonio Roadrunners.

I originally had put this event on the calendar to have a warm weather distance event to test myself with. However when I arrived at the race site, I actually waited until 7:30 a.m. (before an 8:00 a.m. start time) to register as the park area - which is close to the San Antonio airport - had been deluged by rain.

The blessing in disguise is that while the temperature was 78 degrees it actually felt cooler with the recent rains.

The course is one that I was very familiar with. In fact, painstakingingly familiar with. And it is a 4-loop course! Each loop is approximately 2.97 miles while the first loop has an additional mile tacked on before the start of the loop while the last loop has approximately two or three tenths of a mile at the very end of the loop (to the finish line). One published description had the first loop as 3.8 miles and the following three legs each being 3.1 miles, but this just couldn't be.

In 2004, I covered the course in 2:31:13 and finished 89 out of 92 runners. Last year in my first attempt at the distance on the other side of a left achilles problem, I slogged it out in 2:43:45.72 and was 152nd of 161 runners. (These finishes didn't even begin to count all of the relay teams that ran the 4-leg race.) Both days the temperature was broiling.

My goal was to try to run as even a pace as I possibly could even though 1.) I knew that the course was probably going to be saturated in water and 2.) the fact that I was a little tired.

Both predictions came to fruition early on.

As we passed the first mile marker on the actual loop (which was a little more than 2 miles in), I had already dodged a couple of large bodies of water over the asphalt trail and could already tell that my legs were shot from the workout the night before. From that point on, my goal was to try and make it respectable.

What was respectable? As close to 2:24 -- 11 minutes per mile -- as possible. I even thought about applying the 5-minute run/1-minute walk strategy that HARRA Summer Banquet speaker Jeff Galloway advocates doing. At least it would give me something to possibly talk to him about later that night.

However, I'm too stubborn to that by choice. I simply ran as much as I could and readjusted in the water stops (and where necessary).

While I was there, I saw Alex Zuniga and Clint Sherrouse of the Conroe Elite team. (They were part of the King Tornados team that finished fourth at Beach to Bay last month in Corpus Christi.) On the course, while I was on my third leg and he was finishing the fourth leg of his relay team, Tom Sherwood offered his well wishes.

I hit every water stop, ran most of mile 10 and some of mile 11 in a total downpour and just tried to stay consistent. In the end, I finished in 2:25:45.11 while finishing 131st of 146 runners. Two positives (albeit slight): I set a course PR and I put more runners between me and last place than I had in each of the last two years. (At this pace, I'll have an outside shot of winning it some time when I turn 60.)

I didn't even focus on recording mile splits as I felt that it might discourage me even more. I simply stayed with recording the times for each of the various loops. They were as follows:

Loop 1 (3.88 miles) -- 40:47.21 (10:31/pace)
Loop 2 (3.01 miles) -- 33:42.03 (11:12/pace)
Loop 3 (3.01 miles) -- 33:40.29 (11:11/pace)
Loop 4 (3.20 miles) -- 37:35.58 (11:45/pace)

If I could have held the pace in the middle two loops, I would have easily been under 2:24 and closer to 2:20. (A far cry it seems from the 2:09:58 that I ran in Oregon in March.)

In 2005, the results were as follows:

Loop 1 (3.88 miles) -- 40:26.93
Loop 2 (3.01 miles) -- 36:36.45
Loop 3 (3.01 miles) -- 39:04.06
Loop 4 (3.20 miles) -- 47:49.56

Onward and upward, I guess. Lesson learned, but fun had nonetheless.