Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Annapolis Half Marathon - race report

Well here we go.
This was my first race as a Half Fanatic (number 1509). I was really looking forward to it. This was the inaugural running of this event. So with that in mind I knew there would be some, shall we say, hick ups. And there were.
First, was the traffic and parking. We could not believe that there was so much issues with getting cars into the Navy Academy parking lot and parked. Well it was a good thing that we left with plenty of time to allow us to get prepared and into the corrals.
Speaking of corrals, there were none. Thought that there was going to be some there but none of us saw any. Well we took our position toward the back of the pack. No big deal really. this was not that big of an event. there was maybe around 2500 runners.
They started the race just a little bit behind schedule, but then again it was no big surprise. We get to running. The temperature was in the mid to upper 40s with a cool breeze every now and then. So with that I went with a long compression tech shirt with my Half Fanatic tee over that. Cotton gloves with tights. I was debating on going with shorts and a compression Tee with arm warmers. I am glad that I did not. There were times when it was down right cold, especially when we crossed the bridge.
So we start running around the stadium and into some of the back residential streets. These were very crowded. It might have been a little easier if we did not have to dodge parked cars. Maybe they can fix that for next year.
So as we are going along, we noticed that there were no mile markers. was not too sure what to make out about it. I actually missed the first water stop as they were really short of help and there was no water available and I did not want to wait for a cup so I continued on.
We later found out that the person that was in charge of setting up the mile markers broke his foot that morning.
Well at any rate, it was actually kind of nice not having the mile markers to distract me. I could actually focus on my running.
Another issue that came up on the course was a small out and back section on the Baltimore and Annapolis trail. It was very narrow and to have two lanes of traffic was difficult enough we had some people that were running two even three a breast when they really should not have. I was waiting for someone to run into someone else. Not sure if it ever happened or not, but that part of the course really needs to be addressed.
I will say that spectator support was very good.
Coming up to the end I was feeling very good. Coming in strong. I looked at the clock and it read 2:02 and change. I then looked at my Garmin, which I was trying not to look at the whole time, and it read 1:57 and change. I was really stoked! I did it. I was able to run 13.1 miles in under 2 hours, or did I? Upon closer look, my mileage read 12.7. As did other peoples watches. What happened?!?!
Well, the course was short. it might have been the fact that the mile markers were not out there but we missed a turn thus making the course short by .35 miles.
I did do some math and calculated my pace for the last mile and it did give me the time of under 2 hours.
However, I was having issues with the time and my wife finally told me to just get over it. Well I am, because when I look back at the goals that I set for myself I realize that it won't be long before I am able to get to a 1:55 or below time in the half marathon. Then it might just be time to start looking at tackling the full marathon beast again.
Only time will tell.