The first 17 miles were phenomenal. I was strong through the hills. I went out fairly slow and maintained my last place position for the first three miles or so. At mile 9 after all the hills I felt super strong and started to push the pace. I had a 2:28:00 half marathon which was great for me considering I was running 13:00/mile pace during the first 5-7 miles. I was feeling invincible until mile 17 when my right leg started to cramp slightly. I slowed down quite a bit. At mile 18 my leg started to cramp quite a bit and my left leg thought it would be fun to cramp as well. I started taking more frequent walk breaks. At mile 19 my right leg seized up with cramps and I had to spend several minutes against a telephone pole stretching and massaging it. From mile 19 onward it was mostly walking/limping with some small runs. I would run approximately 1 minute and then walk 1-2 minutes. This continued for a mile or two until even that was too much running. Then I started walking/limping 3 minutes or so and then walking 30 seconds to a 1 minute depending on when my legs would start to cramp. In the end I got through it and built a big enough margin on the cutoff time that I was able to beat the course cut off time and get my finisher's medal. In the end they were doing the awards ceremony at the finish line as I crossed the finish line. Everything stopped as I crossed and they announced my name and everyone cheered and stopped and patted me on the back. My wife and son were there 50 yards or so before the race and I stopped and kissed them. It was an incredible experience and I admit, I got emotional.

I would have slowed down my overall pace. I would have definitely had more to drink since I think I underestimated how much fluid I needed. I would have trained for more hills and been more consistent with my training so I would not have suffered so much on race day. There were a lot of promising signs, but there was a lot that needs to be fixed.

I stretched in the medical tent and got a post-race massage (better described as tortured).


Pacing, drinking, heat, and inadequate training.


As mentioned previously, the roads were not coned off, the traffic was not controlled to help the runners maintain their run. The volunteers were excellent, but there were not enough for all the stations so as all the runners passed, the volunteers would pack up and race in front of the runners to set up again. At the end there were very few volunteers left to help us slow folks at the large intersections. At the biggest and most dangerous intersection there was no one there, and I just had to act like any other pedestrian and cross with the lights while waiting several minutes for the lights to change (two crossings were required). That being said, I loved the volunteers who were there. For the most part they were friendly and excited to help.