Seattle Half Marathon 2008

Both Kyle and I decided to run the Seattle half marathon a couple of months ago even though we were doing the World Championships 70.3 only a couple weeks before. I am not sure about Kyle but I think the main reason I registered for the race is that my employer paid most of the registration fee. I know not the smartest reason by hey why not. My other motivation was to beat my time from 2 years ago when I ran it as my 1st half marathon ever and I ran a 2:01 when I wanted a 2:00. Last time I felt the course beat me and I wanted to get that ghost out of my head.
Anyway we got up early I ate a slice of pumpkin pie for breakfast along with some nuun (yes looking at this now it seems like the strangest pre race breakfast). Then we drove to the start and got there nice and early, got good parking, took our bag of dry clothes to the drop area. Then it was of to the porta potties and low and behold it was early enough to have no line. After chatting with a few friends we went off to stretch and do a short little warm up run. These are all the reasons I like getting to races nice and early...
When it was time to line up we saw another friend that we met in Clearwater who has recently joined the Pauole Sport Team. We all lined up together but both her and Kyle had faster goals that me so I just did my own thing once the race started. Since we were not very far back in no time at all I was across the start line and off and running.
The first couple of miles through downtown were uneventful other than that with in half a mile the gloves were off, then the arm warmers. Of course I dropped an arm warmer and almost got run when I went back to grab it off the ground. Luckily I survived and kept running. I was almost surprised as the miles went by and all of a sudden I was running into the tunnel completely over heating. I contemplated pouring water on myself but remembered I was not in a triathlon and it was sort of cold out.. So I just kept running though the tunnel/sauna sweating like crazy. Luckily there was a very slight breeze when I ran out of the tunnel to help keep my temperature in line.
I kept my pace very consistent and mostly just had fun with it - no stressing allowed. Monique had mentioned one of her friends would be running and she was going to meet him at mile 5ish so I looked to see if she was still around. She wound up seeing me first and joined me. She was not sure where her friend was but lucky for me she ran with me while she looked around for him. I saw my mom and Jerry cheering on the long hill on Madison (I think) and made sure to smile for the camera since I was alittle to honest in Clearwater.
Monique ran with me and chatted for the rest of the race. It was a good stuff - I did not really feel tightness in my hips till the very last little roller half a mile out from the finish. Even though she kept trying to test me and see if I wanted to run faster or could run faster... but not today which I was ok with it since I still don't feel 100% recovered from Clearwater and the rest of the very long season.
In the end I was happy with my time especially based on not really pushing it to hard and most important I had fun and stayed very positive. It was the perfect ending to my very very long season.

Kyle, my Mom and I.


Monique and I after the race.

Overall finish time 1:50:42
mile splits - 7:57, 7:47, 8:24, 8:13, 8:21, 8:12, 8:31, 9:01, 8:22, 9:19, 8:14, 8:11, 8:18, 1:46
some other funny data is that my average heart rate was 188 bpm - totally normal for me but my max was 201 bpm - always find that funny how high it can get.