Hoped for all-time PR, top 5 overall, and age group win. Got the latter two. PR (1:35:33) was a possibility for the first 4 miles or so, but I slipped off my target pace after that and then my mid-back seized up for the first time in quite awhile. Bad enough that I consciously backed off my pace to protect it the last two miles (once I knew that I was safely in 4th overall and pretty certain of at least getting under 1:38).

Maybe not bike to my Saturday nonprofit bookkeeping job with a backpack on. I haven't been having any issues with my mid-back (where my compression fracture was in 2015) lately...this was the worst flareup in over a year, I'm sure. No issues with my legs (other than once they were very fatigued at the end), but the back was bad.

Just walked around what passed for an expo waiting for an AG medal...that they ran out of!


Back pain.

This was my third fastest half marathon lifetime and exactly 2 minutes off my PR from 2012.


This is a "grass roots" event, but could definitely be managed better. The participant shirts had not been received by the race company prior to the race, so they were promising to "mail or deliver" them the week after the race. Then they ran out of first-place age group medals before they got to the half marathon awards. On course drink cups were not much bigger than bathroom-size Dixie cups and the volunteers were eager, but really young. $95 for packet-pickup registration was a lot for a race this generally stripped-down.