Cellcom Green Bay Half Marathon - RunHalf Marathon

I was staying with freezerpop and deb and sue were across the hall so the 4 of us walked over together (actually, we managed to catch the shuttle bus so by "walked" I mean, about 10 steps). Freeze and Sue were doing the full, deb and I were halfsies.

It was about 70 degrees in the morning but we knew that wouldn't last too long. Weather predictions had it in the high 80s and the race had sent out emails saying there would be extra water and ice along the course so BE SMART. Not one of my strengths but I was planning on trying. I was more worried about the full folks - it was going to be brutal for them.

Hugs, hugs, pictures, hugs and we were off. I figured I would take that BE SMART theme and apply it to my whole day so the first smart thing I did was find the 1:50 pacer. Jumped in right behind him and tried to turn off my brain (another smart thing to do if you've ever heard me when my mouth is brain dumping). First mile was a bit slow just trying to get around folks but then we seemed to settle in. Until - D'OH! why is the 2 hour pace group running right alongside the 1:50 pace group? I could tell our pacer was shocked and you could almost see him wind up to let it fly. He immediately started dropping the pace and we were flying along. I don't know if it was because I wasn't right on his shoulder but the pacing felt really erratic after that - I would settle in and then all of a sudden he'd be way ahead of me and I'd sprint to catch up, settle in, rinse repeat. He walked all the water stops but those stops got briefer and briefer (or at least, seemed to).

Finally, around mile 6, I just let them go, I was taking longer and longer at each water stop and he was getting further and further away. Man - that is demoralizing to watch your goal literally run away from you. But I knew I had to ... say it with me kids.... BE SMART. And smart for me was walking every single water station, making sure I was drinking and dumping water on my head to stay cool. I was running the pace I wanted to be running but my water stops got longer and longer throughout the race, definitely slowing me down (perfectly reflected in my splits!)

8:57, 8:40, 8:03, 8:24, 8:22, 8:32, 8:34, 8:46, 8:41, 9:04, 8:57, 8:33, 8:37, 7:26 (last .2)

Mile 7 was really hard for me - it includes a long hill, a GU stop and a water stop so I found a bunch of excuses to stop and take breaks. It was a real mental challenge to force myself to keep going at this point. It was hot, I was hurting (already!!) and I felt like I still had way too far to go. I just wanted it to be done. I trudged through, just kept pushing and thinking about this .gif I saw on tumblr that morning that kept flashing the words, "yes, I can" - thought of that and just kept going.

A ton of people had sprinklers out (THANK YOU PEOPLE OF GB!) and I was running through as many as I could. There was this guy running right behind me and he kept chanting to the crowd to get them to cheer louder - at first it was annoying and then it was hilarious. He would yell out stuff like, "Let's go watchers! ::clap clap clapclapclap::" and let's go sprinklers! let's go walkers! let's go sitters! I don't know how in the world this guy had the lung power to yell like that - I could barely breath and here he was screaming like a cheerleader at the state championship. He kind of got me out of my funk and on the next sprinkler, I threw my hands in the air and went through as a Woo girl - you know, the girls who always yell, "WOOOOOO!!!" Yep - that was me. A sweaty, clompy woo girl.

So made it through the slump and settled in again, still running my pace but taking longer and longer at each water station - at this point in the race (mile 8-11), people were still doing fine around me. Most people I saw were stopping at the water stations, keeping cool, taking it easy - heard a lot of people talking about not hitting their goal or being slow, etc.

The volunteer support was incredible - SO many people at the water stations with tons of water, gatorade and apparently ice, although I never saw it. Great crowd support too. Tons of people out there cheering.

My plan was to try and kick it in with everything I had after mile 11 but my "everything" turned out to be not a whole lot left. And then mile 12 was when things started to get ugly - not for me but for other racers. Saw 2 people passed out on the ground, surrounded by medics slapping their faces, "wake up! wake up!" Saw a couple of people wavering really bad on the side of the street with medics walking with them. I was about a half mile away and wanted to hammer home but my hammer turned out to be more of a blunt knife - I was definitely influenced by what I was seeing on the road.

Finished and felt pretty awful but mostly really happy to be done.

Wandered around a bit, waiting for my friends to start coming in. I headed over to the end of the parking lot where racers made the turn into the long finishing chute. That was when the carnage of the day started to unfold. There were people going down left and right, you saw and heard ambulances and medics scrambling around. The band had to stop down at least twice to call for a medic because people were passing out in front of the stage.

Saw the top marathoners come in but then it got kind of quiet as far as racers coming in. I was still waiting for deb to come in for the half and waiting... waiting... waiting... I finally see her and she's walking. At first I was all nice and hey!! And then I thought, wait - RUN!! It's the finish!! But before I could say a word, she threw her hands in the air, exasperated and said, "they called it!" I had no idea what she was talking about and still wanted to jump the fence and push her towards the finish line. Then I realized she meant they cancelled the race. I was stunned. And my first thought was freeze and sue.

Deb found me and she had freeze and Sue with her - they'd found each other at the finish. I got tears in my eyes as I saw the two of them walking towards me - all that training and you only get to run half the race. I was devastated for them. As the day unfolded, we were just all bummed about the race but then as the next day came, I started to just get mad.

The runners who ignored their bodies, ignored the weather, ignored the conditions and just bullied their way towards their goal, they ruined it for the everyone else. They didn't take in fluids, they didn't stay cool, I would guess many of them weren't trained properly - that's not to say they weren't fit because everyone I saw go down was very fit but being fit and being race ready are two very different things. Letting your ego get in the way of your health is just ridiculous. I had big goals for the day but I was trained and I was smart - and I let my goals go when I knew that it wouldn't be smart or safe to go gang busters after it. I'm not kenyan, I'm not a professional runner, I train in my spare time and I get in what I can - so I played it smart.

I gave the day everything I had but I also respected the race and respected my body. The folks who didn't respect the race ruined months and months of preparation for those who did.

I'm sure the race director will get quite a bit of backlash but I hope people realize he did what he had to do. The county was out of support. Green Bay is a small town - they only have so many ambulances, they only have so many hospitals. Once they're out, they're out. Even if only 1 more person went down, that would have been 1 person with zero help. And since people were crashing an hour 40 into the race - it would have been a heck of a lot more than 1 person.

One cool thing was that once they shut down the race, the race officials closed the finishing chute. The marathoners who decided to finish despite the race being called were greeted by a b!tchy race offical in a blue shirt and jean skirt growling at them to stop. Well, some runners said, F that! And ran right past, jumping the fence and finishing anyway (ok, but seriously - how do you jump a fence at the end of a marathon?!?! Amazeballs) The crowd around the finish area was getting so angry at this woman that we all started hollering at her and the volunteers to open the gate and let them in. She kept closing it after racers would open it and we would all yell at her. These two 13 year old boys were the volunteers stationed there and they had NO idea what to do. They didn't want to close the gate but this angry woman kept yelling at them to close it so mostly they just stood there and played dumb. Kind of awesome. Eventually another race official came over and kind of defiantly opened the gate. The lady disappeared and the crowd cheered.


(you know, I usually try and keep race reports light and fun but this one just didn't feel light or fun - it was incredibly disappointing for the full marathoners and halfsies that didn't get to finish. While I was proud of my performance, I was bummed that I didn't get to chase a time goal that I'd had in my head for months... overall, kind of an intense experience. Overall great but yea... intense)