Race Report!

2:53:12 in San Diego, 3rd in Age Group, 48th overall and 37th Man to finish.

WOOHOO thats a 10 minute plus PR, and I hit every one of my previously listed goals besides breaking 2:50.

Here is the report: RocknRoll San Diego was, as I expected, a challenging course to set a really fast PR. With 30,000 people at the start, a June running and a course that leaves a lot to be desired, I knew that running 2:50 was possible, but that I would need to run a smart race. I did not. Came through the half in 1:23:30, feeling pretty easy, but by the time I got to mile 16 I begin to feel a ton of discomfort in my stomach. Not bad enough to make me spew, but just felt like I was not getting any benefit from the shot blocks I had been eating.

From there, I hung in at my 6:30 goal pace up until about mile 20, where I was feeling really discouraged. I ran the entire way alone, and I begin to battle with the mental demons inherent to the marathon "why are you doing this" "drop out DROP OUT" and "Just Walk it in." I have DNF'ed once before because of a Hamstring issue, but this was about as close as I have ever been to just calling it a race. Fortunately though, I got it together enough to just commit to not walking until "the end of the next mile."

The last 10k is along one a bay a little bit inland, and it was brutal. Not a lot of air, fairly warm weather and direct sunlight, combined with my glycogen depleted legs really demoralized me, but after seeing some of the people in front of me dropping out/spewing I figured I was actually hurting a lot less than plenty of others. My parents handed me a bottle of blue gatorade at mile 21 That I credit with helping me hand in and finish up. :

I ended up coming in very slowly – ran the last 10k in about 42-43 mins, but the most brutal part of the race came at the end, when I got confused about where the finish line was. I sprinted through what I thought was the line, then slowed down, only to hear people yelling “keep going” then I did the same thing a second time. It was a pretty difficult race to be sure, but I definitely felt gratified by hanging in there and still making it a positive experience and a big PR. I am not hurting too bad today, and I jumped in the ocean and soaked in a tub with Epsom salt, so hopefully with some quality rest I will be back at it soon.

This is what I looked like after finishing: