Race Report

Scheduled: Half Marathon
Actual: 13.35 (according to my Garmin… which is GOD)
Time: 2:55:59
Pace:

3:00 a.m.:
My wake-up call gets me up so I can chow down on some mini bagels and peanut butter and watch the movie “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang”.

4:30 a.m.:
I’m in the lobby waiting for my ride to drive me to the start of the race

4:45 a.m.:
After being dropped off in the middle of Miami I start following a pack of people who look like they might be running the race. I’m sure they were slightly weirded out because I think I hovered a little too close.

5:30 a.m.:
The race director started to herd people into their start corrals.

6:15 a.m.:
The gun goes off and I don’t move.

6:30 a.m.:
Finally crossing the start I am on my way. It is still dark and the temperature was a perfect 60ish degrees.

9:15ish a.m.:
I turn the corner and can see the finish chute. As I cross the finish line I raise my hand in the air… wave them around like I just don’t care… and am awarded my finishers medal.

Highlights:

I was super nervous during my training that the weather was going to be super hot and my body wasn’t going to be prepared. FORTUNATELY, the weather was PERFECT running weather. I PRed (personal record) my time by 2 minutes which I was happy about, even though it could have been a few minutes more if I hadn’t needed to stop and pee in the bathrooms in some random park. It was hard running without a running partner, or seeing any familiar faces but I tried setting goals to keep myself motivated. For example, there was a man running with a HUGE knee brace and crutches. I saw him at the start and was in complete awe of him. When I saw him at mile 11 I thought to myself, “self, there is NO WAY IN HELL this man is going to beat you…” and he didn’t. Barely.

Another thing I enjoyed about the race was that it was very “slow runner” friendly. There was not a single stretch when I was running alone. There were tons of runners and joggers and ahem… walkers… around me at all times. There were also plenty of water stations and cheering stations along the way. It was nice to run along the water, and be able to go from downtown Miami to Miami Beach and along all the causeways. I liked being able to run in a new environment and run by where Al Capone lived and died. It was also cool that the half marathon and the full marathon came together at the end chute so as I was finishing 13.35 miles, I could see the people who run faster than I can sprint for 26.2 miles.

My only regret was that I had to train so much on the treadmill. Although the treadmill and I became BFF, my knees kinda went into shock when I had to run the entire race on concrete. At mile 5 my left knee started to hurt and by mile 9 I had to take semi frequent walk breaks (although none more than a minute or two at a time).

And now for the thanks. I would like to thank the weather gods for bringing me perfect running conditions, my I-pod for randomly selecting great songs to run to, my Mom and Bonnie for driving in the mini van to see me at the finish, the man that handed out the bananas at the end of the race for me to eat (gosh that sounded dirty) and finally the man with the knee brace for pushing me to run a little faster at the end.