When I signed up for this race I set myself a goal: 1:25, and I stuck to it until last Wednesday, when I had the brilliant idea to change my goal pace. This was done based on a couple of factors. First, I have been running at a faster pace in the last month or so, and I feel I have improved considerably. Based on the McMillan calculator, using the first 5k in a duathlon I did last month, I should be able to run the 15k at a 8:38 pace, so I thought I would be fine going for 8:30. The other factor was THE BET! Here is how this came about, I have a co-worker who is 15 years younger than me and a serious runner. When we talked about Gasparilla and about the goal I had of 1:25, the conversation ended up with him setting up that same goal for his Half Marathon. Therefore, we created the following bet, if he was able to go under 1:25, we would both sign up for a race of his choosing, if he did not break 1:25 AND was slower than my 15k, we would both do a race of my choosing, which I already told him is the St. Anthony's triathlon on April 29. He hates swimming by the way (as do 33% of triathletes...I know, I made this number up ;) )
Anyway, I felt like he had gotten the short end of the stick, so I told him Wednesday that I was going to shoot for 1:20, and if I blew up, then he would probably have more time for his Half.

I still believe I could have done the race at a 8:30 pace, if the weather had not been as brutal as it was! And this was my big mistake. Upon seeing it was going to be hot and sunny, I should have gone back to my 9:00 pace and if I had anything left, increase the pace towards the end. But I am not that smart! My ego won the day and I lined up with the 8:30 group :(

We started at 7:05 am and at that point it was hot but not too bad. In the first two miles we had to deal with a LOT of traffic, since there was almost 5,000 people racing. I still don't understand why people can't line up according to their pace though. When you have someone that started way up in front walking leisurely in the first half mile and having people having to run around them, it is really annoying!

The traffic also results in the 8:30 pace being a little harder than normal, since you have to continuously speed up and brake, change directions, etc. By the third mile traffic was not an issue anymore, but I started feeling the heat already, and with the HR at 174, things did not look good. In mile 4 I lost the pace group, I could still see them since they were 15 seconds ahead of me, but I knew I was in trouble. Mile 6 I slowed down some more and it was time to face reality, this was going south fast, I walked through the water station to see if that helped, but it did not.

Shortly after that I decided it was time to change my strategy, I decided to walk until my HR went down to a more manageable level, so I did this for a bit, and when I started running again I did so at a slower pace. Mile 7 was the slowest one, and I did two walk breaks. During mile 8 I started feeling a little better, but still walked for a little bit (shorter though). Then walked the water station right before the mile marker and decided to try to give it all in the last 1.3 miles.

Looking at my Garmin I knew that if I could go at 9:00 pace for the last 1.3 miles I would come in right around 1:25. Achieving my original goal, and not giving my rival in the bet any extra time tomorrow in his Half Marathon, seemed like a pretty good outcome after the suffering earlier in the race. So I went into the hurt locker and took off. How crazy is it that I came in at exactly 1:25:00?!

I also learned something about me. My max HR based on age is 183, and I have never gone above that. Today in the last 0.3 miles of the race, I reached 186. That shows how much I pushed in this race, even in a bad situation, and I am kind of proud about that :)

Adapt my strategy according to the conditions. I should have gone with the 9:00 pace group. I probably would have ended slightly faster than I did and with much less pain.

When I crossed the finish line I could barely walk. I kept moving, but it was hard to will my legs to obey. I drank 3 bottles of water in the chute, and had a banana, a smoothie and some Gatorade. Met with a friend from work, who finished 12 minutes before me, but also had a tough time and ended up with a time 10 minutes slower than expected, and then we walked towards the parking lot at work. I did some slight stretching and drove home. After that I stretched some more and took a long shower and did some more stretching. Then slept for about 40 minutes and went for a massage.


The heat and humidity.


Putting together a race this size is impressive in terms of logistics. Besides the 5,000 people in the 15k, there were 12,000 running the 5k right after that. The organization was impressive, the medals were very nice and I also liked the t-shirts. The thing they missed was better food at the finish line. The choices were extremely limited. In previous years, the restaurant Columbia has Paella, this year they did lentil soup, which I tried and was really unappetizing, especially at 8:30 am :)