Yesterday I ran my 3rd official half marathon. And in doing so, I beat my 14 year old PR for that distance. My previous best was set way back in 1996 and was a 1:58:54. Yesterday I pulled off a 1:52:19 with Chris right by my side. I am not sure if setting a new PR, or seeing him accomplish what we set out to do was more fulfilling. Either way, we rocked this one!
The day started off pretty early for me. For what ever reason I ended up waking up around 3 am. Not really that out of the ordinary for a 3rd shifter, but not what I wanted to happen on race day. I tried to get back to sleep with no luck, so I just said screw it and got up about 30 minutes earlier than I had planned. After getting some breakfast and just relaxing for a bit it was time to suit up. Before I knew it Chris was in front of the house and we were on our way.
The group of runners that we train with had planned on meeting at the Y around 5:30 am. We drove through the parking lot about 5:20 and no one was there, so we went ahead and made our way to Chris's wifes parking garage she uses for work, which was about 5 block from the finish. I would say we made it there just before 6.
The weather forecast leading up to race day was all over the place. There was a 30 - 80% chance of rain, depending on where your info came from. Tom had told us the day before to make sure and bring garbage bags to cover up with while waiting for the race to start. A great tip from a marathoner. I would have never thought of that. So once we got parked and garbaged bagged up, it was off to the shuttle to the starting line. Lucky for us, there was a bus just getting ready to leave when we got on. I would say it took about 20 minutes to make it to the starting area.
Once we made it to the starting area we found shelter from the rain under a bank awning. We hung out there with plenty of other runners before deciding to look for our friends. We made our way towards the bus drop off area and porta potties. No luck in locating anyone. We decided to make a quick bathroom pit stop and then head to the starting corral.
We made it to the starting corral about 15 minutes before race time. We looked through the entire corral and could not find anyone we knew. Just before the race was about to begin, we saw Garry, Shawna, Jen, and Jeff walking along the outside of the corral. We yelled to them with no luck.
Not long after that we were on our way! We had about a mile before hitting Iroquois Park and 3 miles of hills. As we ran, we were looking for anyone we knew. I seriously think this made the park and those hills fly by. They didn't seem to be that big of a deal at all. At probably 2 1/2 miles in we saw Jeff up ahead. And of course he had already taken his shirt off! We managed to catch up to him fairly easy. He told us that Tom was only about 50 yards ahead. So we bid him farewell and headed after Tom. As we came upon the next Powerade/water stop, I saw Tom standing on the side of the road. We stopped for just a moment and talked with him. He was waiting on his friend Carol to catch up. After finding Tom we settled into a pretty nice pace.
Last year I hated running through Churchill Downs. Mainly because of the tunnels you have to use that go under the track. To me they suck! It is a steep downhill followed by a steep uphill. This is about 7 miles in. They weren't as bad this year. On the final tunnel Chris pushed ahead and was flying. I just fell in behind and followed suit. Before I knew it, we were out of Churchill and back on flat streets.
We had set a goal of running this thing in under 2 hours. That meant that a time of 1:59:59 would have done the trick. I knew with 4 miles to go that we had this thing in the bag. We would have run 10 minute miles from that point and still hit a 1:56! Chris was a trooper. I could tell that he was tired, but he never complained. Not one time! The only time he actually said it out loud was when I asked how he was doing. His response was: "Fine, just tired."
I was all over the place with telling him how we could finish. I had told him at mile 5 that when I saw the finish I was gone. Then later I changed my mind and said that we started this together, let's finish it together. That ended up being the one we went with. I am damn glad we did! Finishing the race in under 2 hours with Chris by my side just put the icing on this one.
After getting through the finish area we headed for the free beer. Then it was to the car for a much needed change of clothes. I don't think dry clothes have ever felt so good. Chris had packed a couple of post race Leinenkugel's for us to celebrate with, which we did in true Yeti fashion. We then headed to where the marathoners head across the bridge to Indiana to watch for our friends. We found Jeff and Tom waiting in that area as well. Within a half hour our friend made it to our location. They stopped for just a moment to pick up Tom, who had planned to run the last part of the run with them. After they departed, we bid Jeff farewell for a second time and headed home.
What an awesome race. Up next for Chris and I will be the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon.
Later
Great recap. It was like reliving it, without all the grueling running!
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