Monday, June 1, 2009

OKC Half Marathon

It has been way too long since I last updated but I have been super busy with a new job, training and fence building.

The OKC Half Marathon was kind of in a weird spot for me. I handing really trained for in since I was in a post Houston Marathon recovery period for training and pre Half Ironman training. I don't think I ever did a run longer than 9 miles leading up to it. The weekend before the race was pretty nice, a little windy but not too bad. Unfortunatly race day wasn't like that at all. Lots of wind and hot. Probably the hottest day of the year up to that point.

I got VIP passes from work so I was able to park right next to the start area. I felt like I was running late but I was able to hit the restrooms and make my way up to the start corral to where my pace should be. Not long after the gun went off and we were moving. It was wind from the south so we would have it kind of at our backs for the first part of the race. I wish it would have been a straighter route so we would have it at our back more but we wound past the capitol building and through neighborhoods. About the time we were at mile 3 I knew I wasn't going to make my goal of 1:45. It was just too warm and I was laboring too much. I made it to the 10k in just over 52 minutes. Not too bad but off of what I wanted to hit.

Then came the fun part. About mile 8 we started turning south right into the wind. It was blowing about 20mph and felt like 50. The temps were up in the upper 70s and there wasn't much shade. I was so glad that I was only doing the half this year. The full would have killed me. I just kept moving along as fast as I could. I ended up finishing in a new best for me, 1:53:44. I may try again for a half marathon on 1:45 in Dallas in December.

Now it is triathlon training full time. It is almost a job in itself.

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