March Madness Half Marathon - RunHalf Marathon


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Cary, Illinois
United States
hillstriders
39F / 4C
Sunny
 		Total Time = 2h 26m 50s
Overall Rank = 932/1000
Age Group = 30-34
Age Group Rank = 55/?
Pre-race routine:

I got up at 5:30 am, ran 6 min on the treadmill, had a banana and a Cliff bar . I had a cup of coffee and about 20 oz of water. I also took a couple of Tylenol as a preemptive strike on upcoming muscle soreness(a girl can try, right?). The night before, we were going to go to Olive Garden and I was going to have shrimp and pasta, but the wait was 45 min, so we got take out from Famous Dave's instead. All my plans to eat nice carbs went out the window as I had rib tips and fries. AND, I had ice cream yesterday, when I decided before hand I'd be careful with dairy. It never bothers me, but I wanted to be careful and not tempt fate if I didn't have to. Naughty, I know. I was kind of worried this morning about the whole no bathroom deal during the race, but it all worked out great (hehe). Next time, pasta.
Event warmup:

Just 6 min on the treadmill, a little stretching at home, a short little job in the parking lot at the race location.
Run
  • 2h 26m 50s
  • 13.1 miles
  • 11m 13s  min/mile
Comments:

The run was GREAT!!! The weather couldn't be more beautiful! It was a gorgeous, gorgeous day today-it was 32 degrees when we started and warmed up to about 40 later on. The forecast called for rain and snow (eek), but we had only sunshine! It was incredible. I really couldn't have asked for better weather! I wore UnderArmour ColdGear tights, UA SubZero Mock turtleneck (also ColdGear), a light fleece jacket, fleece hat and gloves. The tights were perfect for the weather. The mock and the fleecey were almost too much at times, but not to the point of too hot. At about 1.5 miles into the race, I took the gloves on and never put them back on.
What would you do differently?:

Train to run a faster mile! I was very happy with my time for this race, but just want to get faster overall.
Post race
Warm down:

Does being deliriously happy to have finished count? hehe I did do some stretching after some water, pretzel and a banana. I also took a couple of ibuprofen to help with soreness.

What limited your ability to perform faster:

Not enough speedwork training, as well as hill training.

Event comments:

The race was very well organized, I felt. We started a couple of minutes late, but that was no big deal. The roads were nicely marked off for traffic. There were a ton of volunteers who all seemed very friendly, encouraging and supportive. Drink stations every 2.5 miles seemed perfect for me. 3 bathrooms on the course seemed like enough, as well. I noticed that the volunteers kept the drinking stations clean, picked up water/gatorade cups more promptly than most races I've seen. In fact, at most of the stations, most runners put the used cups into the trash bags instead of throwing them on the ground. I also only saw one Gu packet on the ground, so that was pretty impressive :) At the finish line, they had a tent set up with a computer...a few min after your finish, you could go up there and they gave you a detailed printout with your time and where you placed overall, in your sex group, age group and avg time per mile. I thought that was neat! They had plenty of bananas, apples, yummy pretzels, water, coffee and hot chocolate-even when slow pokes like me got done with the run. Overall, I think the race was superbly organized and I will definitely be running it again :)




Last updated: 2007-03-18 12:00 AM
Running
02:26:50 | 13.1 miles | 11m 13s  min/mile
Age Group: 0/?
Overall: 0/1000
Performance: Good
My heart rate was pretty high most of the race. I usually run 5 min and walk 1 min-that's how i run every single time, no matter if it's speed, tempo, or easy run. Today, the course was very hilly, so I made sure I ran every downhill, which put my walk breaks intervals at about 6:1 to 8:1 for most of the race. My highest HR was around 174, average, probably 168.
Course: From the Hillstriders' Website: "The course is 'world-renowned' for its hills. The March Madness Marathon Course has been dubbed the most challenging in Northern Illinois and an excellent training race for spring marathons. Difficulty will be determined by the individual runner's pace and threshold for pain. We strongly recommend that you train for this race on hills, both uphill and downhill. On a scale of 1 to 10, we rate this 8." The course was definitely hilly...Lots of smaller rolling ones and a few nasty loooooooooong ones. I felt ok, though. I made sure to run fast every downhill-not all out, but fast-I think my highest speed on a downhill was 6.9, and I averaged probably around 6.4 mph. The flat segments speed was around 5.4 for most of the race.
Keeping cool Good Drinking Just right
Post race
Weight change: %?
Overall: Good
Mental exertion [1-5] 5
Physical exertion [1-5] 5
Good race? Yes
Evaluation
Course challenge Just right
Organized? Yes
Events on-time? Yes
Lots of volunteers? Yes
Plenty of drinks? Yes
Post race activities: Good
Race evaluation [1-5] 5