Kaiser Half-Marathon 2012 Race Report: My Optimal Plan Realized (with 2 seconds to spare)

The last few days have been a blur.  It's like my life was on fast-forward and it hasn't slowed down.   I am looking forward to tomorrow when I will get a chance to relax.

On Friday morning Miguel, the kids and I flew down to southern California.  We spent the day getting ready for the funeral and I had a bit of respite while getting a pedicure.  I was supposed to go with my mom but we were too late so I went solo.  There was food everywhere I ate like a starving girl.  I just didn't care.  Friday evening was the viewing; I went first and then Miguel went - I didn't think it was a good idea to take the kids.  Come bedtime I was exhausted.

Saturday was the funeral.  My family does not mess around when it comes to saying goodbye.  It was a beautiful service for a truly amazing man and I shed more than a few tears.  Marek said goodbye to Grandad, despite being a bit confused and asking to see him.  Military honors, with Taps played, were delivered graveside and again the tears flowed.  What an emotional day.  We had a whirlwind late lunch with the family (and I just kept eating like it was my last meal) and then left late for the airport - we weren't sure we'd make our flight.  Thank goodness we did.

We walked in our front door at 7:30pm and all of us were cranky and tired.  I got all my stuff together in the midst of feeding the kids dinner and getting them ready for bed.  I had my fingers crossed that I wasn't forgetting anything.  My water intake and sleep had been really bad the days prior so I wanted to get to bed early to try and make up some lost time. 

I got up at 5:30am today.  I am on day 3 (I think) of my period and thankfully it's already slowed down so I was pretty confident I'd get by without a changing of the guard.  Anyway, I got my gear together while I ate a bowl of cereal and had some coffee.  I left at 6:10am to meet my friends, Jackie and Laurie, two mommy friends that did the race with me.  Here we are pre-race, Laurie on my right and Jackie on my left.  They are so awesome and supportive.  Sheesh, I look tired.

After killing some time in line for the porta-potty and then standing around stretching for a while, it was finally time to start!  I was maybe an 1/8th of a mile behind the starting line and good thing because as soon as I started jogging my laces came untied!  I never double knotted them because I wasn't sure how to put on the timing thing and I figured I'd re-tie them later.  I ran to the side and tied them.  I would have been VERY annoyed with myself if that had happened after I crossed the timing mat.

I've read so much about going out too fast so I really took an easy pace.  I was mostly running between a 12 and 13 minute pace.  The run is an out/back in Golden Gate Park followed by an out/back along the ocean before finishing back in the park.  The weather couldn't have been more perfect, a beautiful mid-60's day with almost no wind to speak of.

Very early on I felt like I had to pee again.  Darned coffee!   Around mile 5 the course passed back by the starting line and I had a big debate with myself if I should hit the porta-potty again.  Ultimately I decided that 1, I had a long way to go and if I feel the urge to pee now, it might be painful later and 2, I'd feel a whole lot more relaxed if I peed.  So I ran up to the potty (fortunately no line at all) and ran out when I was done.  Whew, much better.

I carried on and felt really good.  I messed up my shot-blox eating plan and ate 2 every 2 miles instead of every 3 miles.  I realized my mistake at mile 8 when I saw I only had four left.  So I made a new plan to eat 1 at mile 8 and then 1 at miles 10, 11 and 12.  I had an AccelGel for post-race and knew I could eat that if I needed it.  Running along the ocean was beautiful.  I was prepared to start to struggle between mile 9 and 10, where, on my training runs, I usually had to start in with heavy doses of self talk.  But not so today, I think it was the atmosphere.  I definitely had the aches and pains but all the people kept me distracted and kept me going.  Oh, and I also started to feel the need to pee again.  Thank goodness I'd peed at Mile 5 because there were NOT porta-potties to be had.  I knew I had a few miles to go but figured I'd be fine as I hadn't been drinking a ton of water, just a few sips at each water-station while running.

Around mile 10 a speed walker passed me.  Hmm.  I did not want to be passed by a walker.  Not that there's anything wrong with that, I know some of those speed walkers are way faster than my run pace!  This woman had super long legs and I muttered something to myself about her being a gazelle.  So I checked my pace and my heart rate, both could use a nudge so I picked up the pace.  She caught me several more times and each time I sped up.  The fourth time she caught me I said "enough" and really sped up, maybe to an 11:30 pace and didn't see her again.  It was all just fodder to keep me motivated.

I was SO happy when we made the final turn inland and toward the finish line.  The last 1/2 mile or so is a slight uphill and I was happy to engage my quads.  The last 1/4 mile I was feeling good enough to do a sort-of sprint to the finish line. I picked out a few people that I wanted to pass and just used that as motivation to run!  And whew, there I was.  And ouch!  I just ran 13.125 miles and I felt it. Though, according to my Garmin, 13.32 miles.  I guess that means I didn't cut all the corners I should have.  My Garmin average pace says 12:24 and I am super happy with that.

Laurie and Jackie are both speedier than I am so they were waiting there to give me big congratulatory hugs.  And Laurie took finish line pictures!  Thank you Laurie!!

I love this first one because you can see the shadows of people cheering in the bottom left corner.  So cool.  Also, subtract a few minutes from that finish time since I didn't start when the horn went off.

And a close up of my happy self at the big finish!

After the hugs and a few big sighs of relief (and a quick trip to the porta potty) we walked around and took in the scene.  I ate my AccelGel and drank water.  They had some mats and foam rollers so I took the opportunity to roll my thighs a bit, such a good pain.  And we got some good stretching in before heading for the shuttle back to the car.

It was a great day, somewhat surreal and super rewarding.  I ran the entire time and reached my optimal plan.  You might remember I had optimal and bottom line plans.  They were:

My optimal plan:  Finish in less than 2 hours, 45 minutes.
My bottom line plan:  Finish.

Well, take a look at my official chip time!

 

Thank you to everyone who supported me while I pursued this goal.  Ultimately it was my two legs out there for 13+ miles but I couldn't have gotten to the starting line without you!