3M Half Marathon - RunHalf Marathon

Weather was perfect. Run was great. First 10k flew by and I was feeling great. Knew I could break 2 hours if nothing bad happened. Wanted to do negative splits, but afraid I would run out of time to meet my goal. Actually ran the 1st half of the race faster than I probably should have and then had to slow down a little towards the end. I was glad I had previously run the course. It made it seem easier on race day. No physical problems at all during the race, but afterwards (see below).

Had one Clif shot blok and a honey stinger gel around mile 7.5. Drank a whole bottle of water with Hammer gel during the race. Did not stop at any aid stations.

Drink more fluid before the race. Run longer distances. I only did 13+ miles 4 times before the race, including running the race course once.

I kept walking through the finish line. When I walked down to pick up my bag about 10 minutes after race end, my calves, ankles and feet cramped badly. I almost couldn't stand up. Some wonderful young woman handed me a bottle and said it was potassium and I gratefully drank it. Went to the ART tent. The doc told me to stretch my legs. He also worked on them with the active release stuff.


I'm not sure I could have physically run any faster on that particular day at this stage of my training. Just need to keep practicing.


This was my first half marathon. It was very well-organized other than the bag dropoff in the AM where the lines were quite long. Plenty of volunteers, plenty of distracting sideline activities during the course. Good spectator support and good tents at the end. Lots of good stuff in the goody bag. T-shirts were kind of an ugly color.