Cowtown Half Marathon Race Report

Cowtown Half-Marathon Race Report

2-24-13

 Run fast, take changes

 Pre-Race

Well, let me just start off by saying that for some reason I was dreading this race.  My previous half marathon PR was 1:55:36 and my goal for this race was 1:45 – 1:50.  The week before the race my hamstrings felt tight and I just felt tired.  I also had felt very nauseous on the days leading up to the race.  But overall I felt like my training had went very well.  I especially loved the speed sessions with long intervals. 

I got an email for the Cowtown organizers that included my bib # and Corral #.  I really had no clue what the Corral #1 meant and I didn’t give it another thought.  When we went to eat dinner the night before the race everyone started commenting about Corral #1 and about me being, “the fast one.”  Even though I wanted to break my PR I hadn’t been nervous.  However, after dinner I was super nervous and I was actually dreading the race.  To run 13 miles at a 8:20 – 8:30 min/mile pace seemed daunting.

 So we live in the country where it is peaceful and quiet at night.  Well, downtown Fort Worth on a Saturday night is anything but quiet and peaceful.  There was traffic noise, sirens going off multiple times, people talking in the hall, and people screaming outside at all times of the night!  The alarm went off at 5:00 a.m. and I felt like I had just gone to bed.  Luckily, I had gotten everything organized the night before.  All I had to do was get up and go, no thinking.  So my husband and I left the hotel room at 5:20 a.m. with coffee and a granola bar in hand, to head for the shuttle.  We only had to walk about a block and had to wait about 5 minutes.  

 

Thankfully, we got to wait for the race to start inside, it was only around 34 degrees outside! We chatted and I sipped on Gatorade.  I tried not to think about the race.  My motto is, “Autopilot.”  I was prepared to race, just go do it, no thinking.  Finally, at 6:45 a.m. we headed for the Starting Line and the infamous Corral #1.  It seemed like a blur, but I was on Autopilot. 

The Race

It takes me a long time to warm up so miles 1 and 2 seemed a little difficult but not too taxing.  Somewhere during the 2^nd mile I found the 1:50 pacer, he was a short guy from the Fort Worth Running Club.  Bingo, I decided to stay with him or if I felt good to try to get ahead of him.  On mile 3 my hair came down!  I have really long hair and I wear it in a bun but I got it back up without stopping and I almost forgot to eat a few Honeystinger Chews.  Between mile 3 and 4 my ankle stared to hurt and it never hurts.  This didn’t really worry me at the time, I was on Autopilot.  I checked my mile split and overall time every mile on my trusty Garmin (which has totally changed my life, thanks honey!).  To keep my mind occupied I did mental calculations to try to figure out if I was ahead or behind pace.

 At mile 7 I got more Honeystinger Chews.  I was preparing for the huge mile 9 hill.  Around mile 7 my legs, especially my quads, started to get tired.  In training I had been able to run about 7 miles in 1 hour, during the race I ran about 7.5 miles in 1 hour.  I was really excited, but didn’t dwell on this, Autopilot.  Then, I could see it looming in the distance, the HILL!  Yes, a hell that was a mile long.  Autopilot, no thinking, just run up the hill.  However, about ¾  the way up the hill one strange thought popped into my head, “Man, I wish I was swimming!”  Now I’m certainly not a swimmer and it’s not my favorite or even in my top 10 favorite things to do.  So, it had to be THE HILL, I couldn’t wait to tell Becky!

So after the huge hill the spectators kept yelling, “It’s all downhill from here!”  Well, that was a lie.  There were several more hills and at the top of each one I heard, “Good job, it’s all downhill from now.”  I finally stopped believing them; I needed to get back on Autopilot.

 In some races in the past I have felt like I have had too much left in the tank.  I can honestly say that I was totally done when I finished this race.  Even by husband, who is my toughest critic, said that I looked tired when I crossed the finish line with a time of 1:46:22.  I was 31 out of 628 in my age group (top 5%) and 666 out of 6870 overall (top 10%). 

 My Race Strategy

Put it on Autopilot, run fast, take changes.  This strategy might seem gutsy but it works for me.  I adopted the strategy back in the summer.  My new strategy along with Becky’s fabulous training (Nacogdoches Endurance Training) has helped me break my PR in the 5K by over 1 minute, the 10K by over 5 minutes, and the half-marathon by over 9 minutes in just 9 months and I took 1 month off after my Dec. 1, 2012 marathon!

 A big “Thank you” is in order for my supporting husband, Becky (Nacogdoches Endurance Training), and Andrea (my patient workout partner)!