I came, I saw, I conquered...in a manner of speaking. Today, I ran the Chicago Distance Classic Half-Marathon! Despite stomach and course issues, I felt that I did pretty well.
We shall start at the beginning...
My douchebag neighbors partied into the wee hours of the morning Saturday/Sunday. Luckily, I was so tired after the show on Saturday night that I came home, had a cup of tea, and went to bed. When I woke up at 4 AM, they were still partying! Ahhh to be young (relatively speaking). Anywhoo...Kristen and Robin picked me up and we headed down to Grant Park to meet the rest of the CES team for the race. I must say that the conditions had the makings of a great race. The weather was extraordinary for Chicago in August! Loooooooow humidity and the temps were in the low 70's. Most of us decided to stick together for the majority of the race. If you'd already done the Soldier Field 10 mile race, you pretty much knew the course. I found a few differences overall, but I think the course wasn't as bad as I thought it would be! I really enjoyed most of the run. Except for the fact that it was hella crowded nearly the whole way.
Also, according to Joanie Garmin, we actually ran 13.45 miles as opposed to your standard 13.1 miles. Interesting, right? Yes, I thought so. And this was verified by other people with Garmins, as well as other runners who discovered that their splits seemed to lengthen around miles 6 and 7. I felt fairly strong for most of the course. Joanie said that Kristen and I maintained a 10:15 to 10:20 pace for the race. I ran into stomach problems around mile 12, and actually thought I was going to have to stop to use the bathroom, but I slowed up a bit, and managed to finish not far off my goal time.
Needless to say, I was thrilled to redeem myself after the mono half-marathon of May. 20 minutes faster overall!!! I almost couldn't believe it. We had all done pretty well, so we celebrated at Leslee's conveniently located condo in the South Loop.
Enjoy some pictures, and thanks for your support :)
6 comments:
Yes! I totally thought it was weird when mile 7 didn't show up when I thought it was going to show up! I really wasn't convinced that I had slowed down that much at that point.
Anyway, congrats on your race!
CONGRATS chica!!! You did AWESOME ;D ;D ;D
Nice job!!!! Way to blow your previous time out of the water!
Hmmm, that is odd, that's a long way for your Garmin to be off. I had a moment like that in the Flying Pig Marathon...and turns out it WAS longer than 26.2. It was like a 1/4 mile more due to the course being changed at the last minute because a big fire.
Glad you liked the course. I'm still mad about the course change, even though I didn't even get to run it! Grrrrr.
Nice job. 20 minutes is crazy good improvement!
Cleveland used that same timing system. Sorry about the poor course measurements.
Great job! I love Chicago running. The city is MADE for road races if we could get all those pesky cars out of the way.
Twenty minutes faster is amazing - congrats!!!
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