Rock n Roll 1/2 Race Report

I went into this one with 2 goals:

• PR - Accomplished
• Sub 1:30 - Accomplished

I had an important third goal.  I started the race injury free and needed to stay that way for the marathon BQ attempt in 2 weeks.

I can pretty  much say that this was the best race of my life.  Not only do I feel like I crushed it, I felt absolutely fantastic the whole way and was giddy after about mile 8 when I hit the downhill run to the finish because I knew then that I "had it in the bag."

Here is me at Mile 11 having a ball:

The weather was absolutely perfect.  50 degrees and overcast.  Tech shirt was perfect.  Very cold at finish though.

We did a 1.5 mile warm-up with strides before the race.

I started with Dalton and we sent out pretty strong.  The first real hills start about mile 2.5 and I felt great and decided to keep the sub 7 pace until I got cardio constrained or some kind of muscle issue cropped up.  Neither happened.  I made it to Mockingbird at around a 6:55 avg pace and was not breathing hard.

Nick, Sunny, Josh and Shaheen's sister were cheering everyone on and I saw them 4 times.  I also saw Jen, Dan Tracy, Sheri and Blake and Matt and Ken.  All the cheering makes a huge difference in attitude.

The last 6 miles were a breeze in the 6:30s.  I barely felt winded and my form stayed clean.

I really picked it up rolling into fair park and was seriously in the 5s for the last 800-900 meters.

Dalton and I ran 1.5 miles after the race to loosen back up.  I felt loose and energetic all afternoon.

This was a nutrition test for the marathon - Oatmeal before and GU during.  Perfect.  I only did 1/2 cup oatmeal and one GU though.  Also, I hauled ass through the water stops using the squeeze technique.

I was pumped to see Scott Rosa run a beautiful 2:07 first 1/2 and just be ecstatic about his future in running.

Although the splits look even, the energy expenditure was much higher in the first half due to the uphill.  I really like this course, because when you hit that downhill, you know it is easy sailing to the finish...

I finished 12th in age group, 116 overall out of about 11,000 runners and 99th out of the men.

1	6:59
2	6:46
3	6:52
4	6:44
5	6:57
6	6:53
7	6:49
8	6:54
9	6:44
10	6:32
11	6:42
12	6:32
13	6:35
14	1:37