Delaware Half Marathon Race Report

Those who chase states know that sometimes you can plan your races out and other times you can’t and you have to take what the schedule gives you. On March 28th, I was fortunate enough to spot a cheap fare on Continental to Philadelphia (~$200) which would enable me to do the Delaware Half Marathon in Wilmington.

I haven’t been running as regularly as I should, especially during the week in Jackson when my consulting engagement often puts me at the office very late into the evenings.

Nonetheless, I’ve never let the lack of enough runs and/or workouts keep me in the way of accomplishing a different goal and having some fun. The travel logistics are sometimes fun in and of itself and it is great just to go out and take what a course gives you on any given day.

Anybody can pick a race and a specific course profile and train properly for it, and I’m the first one to admit that I admire those individual’s ability to focus, exercise incredible discipline and control and have the intestinal fortitude to stick with a plan. However, it takes somebody a little crazy just to run whatever race you choose to do – just because. It doesn’t make me special. Just different.

I did have a little bit of a plan though. I signed up for the Heels and Hills Half Marathon in Irving on Sunday, May 2 to use kind of as a tune-up, but it was rained out when the storm that blew down the Cowboys training facility also whitewashed the course through the middle of the subsequent evening.

I wasn’t expecting another 2:14 like I did in Mobile in January or a 2:18 like I did in my last half at the end of March at Angie’s Half Crazy! Half Marathon. Why? Most of my runs have only been an hour long and on the treadmill. I haven’t pounded my body against the pavement since the first Saturday in April.

The other reason that I wasn’t expecting much is because I’ve been dealing with some plantar in my left heel off and on since the first of the year. I don’t know if it is because I had the combination of breaking in a new pair of dress shoes, a little extra weight and starting to bike a lot – gearing up for and completing day 2 of MS150 - without bike shoes. It has caused me to alter my gait at times, especially in that left leg. However, I would be undeterred.

I stayed less than three miles from the race site, which was along the riverfront just east of downtown Wilmington. Packet pickup was very easy, but nine minutes cost me $7. I could have parked on the street somewhere, but I felt safer parking in a garage. Well, the garage let marathoners park there for $3 after 6 a.m. and before 3 p.m. But they couldn’t cut any slack for nine minutes.

That also turned out to be the difference between a normal half and Sunday’s performance. Races2run.com had my chip time as 2:25:44. It was the 31st best time of 59 half marathons -- smack dab between the April 9, 2006 Prince George Roadrunners Half, 500 miles north of Vancouver, British Columbia (in 32 degrees weather) and the June 17, 2006 scorcher (with rain), the Carrabba’s Classic Half Marathon in San Antonio.

Mile 1 – 9:55.78
Mile 2 – 10:29.50
Mile 3 – 10:35.25

We had rain much of the first three miles, but it began to dissipate after we turned away from the Wilmington Riverfront and headed west as we started to make our way through one part of downtown. I wasn’t necessarily out of gas in mile two, but I knew early on that it wasn’t going to be a 2:14-2:18 day. The water stations at this event, by the way, were appropriately spaced and well-manned. They called out “water in the front, gatorade in the back” (which is what you’ll hear again at the last water stop at Ten For Texas manned by Friends of the Running Community).

Mile 4 – 10:50.69
Mile 5 – 11:08.23
Mile 6 – 10:54.66

Miles 4 through 6 were through a very beautiful Brandywine Park. This section reminded me much of parts of the courses in Fargo, North Dakota (2007) and Sioux Falls, South Dakota (2008) that I have run. You even crossed a semi-shaky footbridge to cross over Brandywine Creek. I hustled to each mile marker to try to make each split look as good as it could possibly be on less than a great day.

Mile 7 – 12:23.44

Why does mile 7 stand out? Because it was pretty much all slightly uphill along Nottingham Road! It doesn’t compare in steepness to, let’s say, the hill near Bowers Stadium in Huntsville during the Huntsville Half or the one in mile 12 of the News and Sentinel Half Marathon in Parkersburg, West Virginia. This one though just kept going and going and going.

Mile 8 – 11:09.21
Mile 9 – 11:15.37
Mile 10 – 11:11.11
Mile 11 – 11:29.02

The miles above turned out to be pretty consistent because they were, for the most part, flat. We went through what they call the 40 Acres, Wawaset Park and Little Italy sections of Wilmington. The first two sections were old tree lined subdivisions where Steve and Paula Boone had lined N. Bancroft Parkway with signs for 50 States Marathon Club members (like they do at the Texas Marathon on New Year’s Day) while the latter was a block of city streets that took us past the mile 9 marker.

The race is very important for 50 Staters because it is, I believe, the only marathon Delaware has. (Wilmington plays host in the late winter to the very popular Rodney Caesar Half Marathon.)

We got a little bit of the uphill back from mile 7 in mile 11, but a short uphill at the end of that mile kept it a little further away from an even 11-minute split.

Mile 12 – 11:16.86

I took a bit more advantage of a little downhill, but mile 13, with a right hand turn on to Martin Luther King, had the most significant uphill of the day in it. When you’ve run as many events as I do (as this was race #300), you see part of one course in others that you’ve done, like I mentioned earlier. This hill reminded me a little bit of an incline late in the Cowtown Half Marathon in Fort Worth earlier this year.

Mile 13 – 12:00.91
Last .1 – 1:04.26

Therefore, it cost me a little bit of time. However, the last two tenths of a mile were almost even as we passed under the AMTRAK station and train line to make a sharp left hand turn back to the finish line.

I had carried a water bottle with me the entire time. I ditched it right before the final left hand turn so I could make the finish with the “Hook ‘Em Horns” sign on both hands overhead. As I mentioned in the comments on the picture, it is my “out of state” trademark.

All in all, I couldn’t complain. I had just put another state in the books. It is my 25th state. Half2run.com lets me count British Columbia for no. 26 and makes me one of five Texans – including The Woodlands’ Patrick Morein – who have run a half marathon in half or more of the United States.

I’m very fortunate and lucky to get to do the things that I do.

I met Jesse Rios of The Woodlands Cycling Club on the plane ride home. I was in seat 8D and he and his wife where in seats 10D-E. Paula and Steve Boone were in seats 5 E-F. It reminded me that I had first met them four years ago in the airport in Omaha, Nebraska after they were in Runner’s World for getting the Delaware Marathon started.

Oh … before the race, I met Kamiar Kouzekanani of the Corpus Christi Roadrunners and the Austin Runners Club. It was state no. 47 for him. You see his race reports in the Austin Runners Club section of Inside Texas Running. (Wonder if I’ll get a mention!)

Next up (as far as states are concerned) is The Renaissance at Colony Park Marathon in Ridgeland, Mississippi, which is in the same town where I stay in while working in Jackson each week, on Saturday, June 13. Don’t worry, it is a 6:00 a.m. start.