I was supposed to run the Utah Valley marathon this weekend, but when the opportunity to go to Portland/Vancouver for the weekend came up, I made the decision to bail on the race. I had missed a few long runs because of back pain and mentally wasn't invested in running a marathon anyway. The friend we were visiting was running the Vancouver marathon, so I decided to do the half.
I had no idea what I was capable of running, so I decided to see how the first mile went and go from there. I think I got a little too excited as my first mile was 7:58. This is PR pace for me and I had not done PR training. I should have immediately backed off, but in my excitement, I didn't want to "waste" an opportunity at sea level and I had delusions of PRing in the half for the first time in years. I also somehow believed that the course was flat, but it was fairly rolling through the early miles. I felt strong through mile 6, but the only big climb on the course around halfway just wiped me out. My legs felt so heavy. I had planned to pick it up at mile 10, but by then I was running into rain and a headwind and had nothing left. Each mile just got slower from there. I managed to pick it up in the last half mile to barely finish under 1:50. Garmin splits (started it late, so the time is off).
Looking back, I wish I would have run smarter as I think a 1:47-1:48 was possible for me, but I blew it by trying to PR when I wasn't in shape for that. Vancouver did a nice job with this race. I really liked the course and the 55 degree overcast weather was almost perfect (minus the wind at the end).
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