First, the pacing. I know the pacers are only human, they do this for free, and it is not a fool proof system to follow, but my reliance on them really messed me up. At the expo I met the 3:45 pacer, who said they were out of arm bands, but not to worry, just to stick with him. My bib put me in corral 3, but he said 3:45 would be starting in corral 4, so I should stay back in corral 4 at the start. OK, no problem. They had a 3:40 armband, so I took one of those - just in case - and figured I could add ten seconds for every mile during the race and still be on target...more on that in a bit. Race morning and I'm standing in corral 4 searching for the 3:45 sign...nowhere in sight. So I start inching my way up to corral 3, still nowhere in sight. The national anthem plays, the first corrals are off, and up pops the sign. Waaay in front of me - in corral 3 - at the very front. So I figure I can't be more than 20 seconds behind him, there's no room to move and I'm not going to push my way past everyone at this point, and off corral three goes. Except, they divided corral 3 into 'a' and 'b'. I was, unfortunately in 'b', and my pacer had a good 1 min and 20 seconds on me.

Needless to say, I never caught him. The mile markers didn't correspond to my garmin, and my plan to add 10 seconds to every mile - at the mile markers - proved my fuzzy math skills were not up to par during the race. The only point I knew I was on target was at 13.1 when my time was 1:52:13.

Second, the wind on the backstretch. So the course brings you out a looong stretch - to mile 20 - where you turn around at the end and head back. So you see the runners who are in front of you on the way out and behind you on the way back. I was feeling pretty good heading out there, but noticed some of the really strong runners I know suffering immensely - even walking - but just shrugged my shoulders. Maybe they were just having bad days. I was feeling great! Until I passed mile 20, turned to head back into town, and realized I had been running with a relentless wind at my back for the last 5 miles, and now had to head right back into it! Within 5 seconds I knew my BQ was out the door. I still pushed pretty hard, and actually felt pretty good, but the wind was just a bit too overpowering.

I had a pretty good day overall. I feel like my running fitness is on par with a BQ, and hopefully I'll be able to snag it someday soon.

Write paces on my arm.

My fuzzy math and the wind on the last 10K


Very little crowd support and only 3-4 bands that I can recall. But the volunteers were great, the expo was organized and easy to navigate, and overall it was a very well run event.