Top of Utah Half Marathon today. I had been approaching this race wanting it to be a big effort, as it will be my last real race before the marathon in November, and also it's an excellent course with excellent competition with excellent weather. You don't want to pass that up. Training since Des News has been good. Lots of miles and lots of marathon-pace running. However, I knew that our baby due date was pretty close to this race, so I didn't want to get too wrapped up in thinking about it. But our baby came on Thursday night, we were all home on Friday night, and I was granted permission to run today, provided that I came straight home! Not a ton of sleep the last two nights, but given the circumstance not terrible either. Probably about 5 hrs each night. But I was fairly fatigued from all the running around and from coaching Stacy through the delivery. Not really physically tired, but more of the nerves being shot. What Sasha calls "neural fatigue".
Got up around 5AM, and ate my breakfast of oatmeal with brown sugar, vanilla yogurt, and cut-up peaches. Orange juice and coffee for the road. Drove into Providence and got a sweet parking spot on the street that would give me a quick exit right after the race. Got on one of the earlier buses, shuttled up, used the potty, and then warmed up about two miles up the canyon and back. Took another potty stop. No Narnia this year, but I did get in the fastest line. I considered using another set of hidden toilets, which are pit toilets about 300m down the canyon, but by doing so I'd be risking my life my running on a road with no shoulder with buses going in both directions. Decided it was too dangerous, and more of a Mordor than a Narnia, as far as hard-to-find magical places go. They miraculously started the race very close to on time. I really don't know how they shuttled 2300 runners up the canyon, and then backed everyone up to the start line, and only started a few minutes behind schedule. My only guess is that Kris Sidoway (RD) is a taskmaster. She is wicked good with that megaphone. I knew who my competition would be beforehand, from looking at the online start list. The favorite to win would be Patrick Rotich, the Kenyan who's been training in Provo this summer. Also there was Teren Jameson, two-time defending champ and course record holder. If I slipped up, then Steve Shepherd would be there to teach me a lesson. He's a former Weber State runner (I think), whose had some strong showings at the Hobbler Half and Des News 10K this year, among a few other races. But I had beaten him head-to-head at Des News. Patrick had beat Teren head-to-head at several races this summer, and Teren had beaten me head-to-head at a couple races this summer. So we seemed to have a pecking order, although I wanted to overthrow. I like the half marathon distance, and I like my home course, so I wanted to let it rip and see what happens. Although Teren is much speedier and more talented than me, I've been putting in a lot more miles, so I figured this longer distance was my only chance to beat him this year. Patrick seems to have been racing himself into better and better shape over the summer, but I'd be willing to spar with him here in Logan. So hopefully it would be an interesting and fast race. Weather was a little warm (high 50s), but a favorable canyon wind (although not very strong). The race started, and as I expected, both Teren and Patrick got out hard. Patrick took the lead from the gun. I wanted to keep contact from the beginning, and caught up to Teren during the mile, with Patrick a few seconds ahead. Steve Shepherd joined our pack to make three. First mile split was 4:51. I wanted 4:55's down the canyon, so a little fast, but I'm willing to take some risks on this course. Teren and I ran side-by-side for the next mile and eventually started closing the gap on Patrick, who was not running tangents very well (he actually got a lot better with tangents as the race went on). Steve remained on my trail-leg. Mile 2 was 5:00, the slowest split during the first 8 miles. We caught Patrick near the end of the second mile, or maybe the beginning of the third mile. The pace felt hard to me up through now, and then it started getting really crazy. Kenyan runners are known for their crazy surging, and Patrick did nothing to dispel this notion. For the next 4 miles, we would catch him, pass him, and then he'd blitz and pull ahead with a gap. Teren made that worse by surging hard on all of the bigger downhills, and pass Patrick. Then Patrick would pass him back when it flattened, and eventually I would catch both of them. I'm not much of a surger. Steve Shepherd dropped pretty hard during the third mile. Mile 3 was 4:56, Mile 4 was 4:51, Mile 5 was 4:45, Mile 6 was 4:49. 29:14 through 6 miles. Youtch! But I was feeling good, despite all the games. We had a tailwind for these miles. It was not a huge canyon wind, but it extended up the canyon more than usual, although it did not persist much on Hollow Rd. So definitely a helpful wind, but did not aid things as much as some other years. Probably worth 40s over the duration of the race.
After 6 miles, we near the end of the canyon, Patrick had gapped Teren, and Teren had gapped me by little. Eventually I worked my way up to Teren, and ran alongside him for a little while, but then surprisingly dropped him soon thereafter. Mile 7 was another 4:49. After the 7-mile mark, we got onto Hollow Rd. Hollow Rd is still nice
downhill, more gradual, but just as fast, perhaps faster due to the
evenness of the gradient. Patrick had maybe 10-15s on me on Hollow Rd, but he was certainly not coming back. I was hoping he would slow on the hill at Mile 10, but in the back of my mind I remembered that it's usually me that dies on that hill. My pace slowed a little on Mile 8 to 4:54, but still where I wanted to be! Mile 9 is still all on Hollow Rd. It's a speedy section, but I could feel my pace slowing. This mile was 5:04 for me. Patrick was running faster than that,
evidently. I could feel my wheels starting to fall off. Too many
sub-4:50 miles earlier, which was a bit out of the zone I'm trained to
run in. During Mile 10 we exit Hollow Rd and run on Hwy-165. Still a very mellow downhill, but close to flat. 5:05 for this mile. Well, if I can at least hold this pace, it will still average out to a huge PR. 49:09 for the 10-mile split, which is on pace for well under 1:05:00. I'm hoping that I will magically bound up the 1.5-mile long hill coming up in order to do this. Miles 11 & 12 are the hardest in the race. The first half of 11 is still flat, but then we start going up. All of Mile 12 is uphill, and then it crests, and Mile 13 is a net downhill to the finish. As I feared, I slowed even more on Mile 11, to 5:14. But Patrick wasn't pulling ahead anymore, so he was evidently hurting too. I laid an egg on Mile 12, though, with a 5:31 split. We were on the grid system now, and I could see that Patrick was about 2/3 of a block up from me, which is about 25-30s. We finally crested the painful hill (but not soon enough) right after Mile 12. I tried to get my legs under me, but there was nothing there. It looked like Patrick was pulling away again this last mile. When I looked at my watch at Mile 12, I also realized that I wasn't going to break 1:05, which was a bit of a kick in the pants, after thinking it was a certainty just a couple miles ago. But it's hard to pull out that kind of time while plunking a 5:14 and a 5:31 as successive splits. Those really threw it off. But I bore down and did the best I could. I finally got some turnover near the end. Hit Mile 13 with a 5:12. I've done it faster other years, but I'll have to take it. Again, too many too-fast miles early on. Last 0.1 was 30s. Official time was 1:05:38, good for 2nd place overall. It would have been the course record, except I got beat. Patrick Rotich won with 1:05:10, Teren was 3rd with 1:07:35, Steve Shepherd was 4th with 1:08:37. After I finished, I literally kept jogging, and grabbed my bag, and then headed to my car to take off back home in order to not be a deadbeat husband and father. I had arranged for Walter to pick up my prize money at the awards ceremony, so we'll all see how honest Walter is now with 150 bucks! (thanks Walter!). Hopefully he won something good with my bib number in the raffle. I stopped in Logan to get gas (almost empty), and then realized that I grabbed the wrong clothes bag when I opened it up to grab a dry shirt, and there was women's clothes inside! Turns out the bib number on the bag was one number different that mine, and the last name was Petersen. Bah. So I drove back to Providence, put the wrong bag back, and grabbed mine. Ended up bumping into a lot of people and chit-chatted too much, my quick exit and early return home was ruined. Still got home at 9:15AM, but I would have been 8:30AM had I not needed to turn back. Oh well. Stacy still loves me. Took Seth off her hands and cooled down with him in the stroller when I got home.
I'm happy with this race, especially given the what an eventful week it was. I felt sharp; although I paid for an aggressive early pace, sometimes it's worth it to give a hard pace a shot. This time is an aided half marathon PR for me, beating my UVM time by 27s, and beating my last year's TOU Half time by 64s. Moreover, I finally got my sub-1:06, which is a nice stepping stone. Now I just need to stick the last few miles and get a sub-1:05. But it was a nice race amongst other nice races for the year, and does not discourage me from thinking I can get the marathon qualifier. I've had a nice string of half marathons over the span of 2009 and 2010: - Indy Mini, May 2009 - 1:08:35 (unaided PR)
- Seattle RnR, June 2009 - 1:08:12 (unaided PR)
- TOU Half, Aug 2009 - 1:06:42 (aided PR)
- The Other Half, Oct 2009 - 1:09:50 (unaided, altitude PR)
- Indy Mini, May 2010 - 1:08:05 (unaided PR)
- UVM Half, June 2010 - 1:06:05 (aided PR)
- TOU Half, Aug 2010 - 1:05:38 (aided PR)
These are all consecutive half marathons, so it's cool to PR every time I race (although I probably shouldn't count The Other Half...). I've also had two 15K PRs and a 10K PR during this time span. So it's been a great couple years, and I'm very thankful and blessed to be given this second lease on running, after thinking it was all over a couple years ago. No more races until Indy in November. It's just a lot of miles and a lot of workouts for the next two months to prepare for the marathon.
| 