detailed half marathon report!

Last Friday I flew to Austin Texas to run a half marathon with my sister Cate! The half-marathon was on Sunday, January 24.

I said this would be detailed, right? I arrived at the Austin airport and took the great $1 bus into town, near the UT campus. Cate was finishing up class, so I had an espresso at a coffee shop while waiting for her. She picked me up at the coffee shop and we stopped off at a great little taco place and had a couple tacos and a lime/watermelon agua fresca. That agua fresca was good.

After that, we headed home and got ready to do a 3 mile run around Town Lake, which seems more to me like a river. This place is great. It runs right through town and has a gravel path all along it. You can make your route many different lengths by crossing bridges and looping back around. At the main bridge area, there is a constant supply of water coolers with water and cups for runners. There's also an outdoor shower (it gets mighty hot in the summer) which I saw being used when I visited in June. Very cool. We ran our 3 miles at a faster pace than I usually run and it felt good. The rest of the evening we spent at home making dinner and playing with the sweet and silly kitty Luney.

Cate and I stayed busy on Saturday - we went to pick up our race packets (the race was sponsored by 3M so there was lots of tape and post-it notes as swag). We also drove the course, which was a good idea. Cate had some work to do at school, so I got to see her school and classroom. Somewhere in there we stopped at a thrift shop and Starbucks.

The plan for dinner had been to carbo-load at a pizzeria with a gluten-free menu (for me, though that experiment is over) but it was too far away. Instead we went to a great sushi place, then had ice cream for dessert. We all went to bed early that night.

The half-marathon was set to start at 6:45am. On Sunday morning, we awoke at 5am so we could eat breakfast and get ready with some leisure. At about 5:45, Adam drove us to the starting point, despite being sick. (He also stopped along the course in various spots to take pictures of us. Nice guy.)

When we arrived, it was dark, gusty and fairly cold. We dropped off our dry clothes for after the race and wandered around. Eventually we had the idea to wait in one of the portapotty lines, of which there were many, and tangled and confusing. But we managed to take care of business and make it back to the start in plenty of time. (Plenty of time.)

There was quite a crowd. The starting location was in the midst of a large shopping center where parking was relatively abundant. The start line was on a road running through the shopping center. By the time we were ready to "line up" there was no semblance of a line - it was people everywhere in a big crowd, waiting for the gun. The pacing group people were nowhere to be seen. It was fun.

As I said, it was gusty, and apparently the barricades along the course had blown down, allowing cars to go where they shouldn't. This delayed the race by an hour. (Though we didn't know by how long at the time). Bummer. We stood in the cold crowd while the guy at the mike (who we couldn't see) suggested we visit the bathroom again if we needed to. In that interim, Cate and I visited the hotel that was right there (where it was suggested anyone could use the bathroom). The lobby of the hotel was full of runners, warming up, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the run might be starting any minute. Did everyone have their own personal alert system, or were they relying on herd mentality? Cate and I wandered around in the hotel until we decided we were warm enough and headed back out. Shortly thereafter we heard an announcement to LINE UP! Runners literally came running out of that hotel!

We got lined up too and finally that gun did go off! Of course, we did not start running right away. In fact, our clock time and chip time were about 3 minutes apart, so you can tell it was quite a crowd. Our waiting location, though, allowed us to see the wheelchair racers head off first, followed shortly thereafter by the elite runners (don't know if there were any famous people there) and then of course the general crowd, including us!

About a mile after we started running we spied Adam who was waiting at an intersection with his camera. We lifted our fleece jackets to show our numbers (why?) and he got some nice shots of us. At about 1.5 miles we reached our first water station. I stopped for water, Cate did not and she headed off into the half marathon with her speedy legs leading the way.

We'd agreed that she'd go ahead when she felt like it. We also decided to wear some of her giveaway fleece tops to keep us warm, and would just throw them aside when we got too hot. That's the thing to do, apparently. And that's what we did.

Cate and I had driven the course the day before and that was a good idea. When we drove the route it seemed that there was a good bit of highwayish or big wide 5-lane roads. I admit now that I wasn't so sure about that. It didn't look all that fun to run on. When we got to the part of the route that was cute neighborhoody and UT-ish I felt better. Oddly though, during the race I preferred that highwayish part of the run more! Perhaps it was because it was the first half of the run when I felt better anyway, or maybe because it's because, when do I ever get to run on highways? But I enjoyed that part of the race more than the cute little neighborhoods.

The race was 13 miles long, but I was never far from other runners. People just didn't spread out much. That made it more tolerable for me, more interesting, to be constantly running near or past or by someone.

There were occasional musical interludes - my favorite may have been the bagpipe player early on. There was a guy playing solo electric guitar out of the back of his truck. Cate or Adam mentioned seeing a mariachi band, though I don't remember that. The cowbell ringers were annoying.

The race had water stops every 2 miles or so (on the even numbers) and I stopped at each one. I took one gu chomp before the race, at the 2 mile mark, 6 mile mark and one other, later mark that don't remember.

I felt quite good running until about mile 9. I saw Adam at around mile 6 or 7 and remember feeling great. I stayed ahead of the 2:10 pacing group (10 minute mile) until mile 9. Around then, they passed me and then I stopped for water around mile 10 and I never saw them again.

By mile 9 or 10 things started to get rough for me. I began to get quite sore. My hips and arches ached, and I felt as though my left leg might just cramp up entirely. My "speedy" pace was perhaps catching up with me. I hit mile 11 an thought "I've never run this far before." But, I kept at it. Around mile 10 or so I noticed a LOT of people passing me. Oh well.

By mile 12 or so I was doing all I could to not walk. I just kept plugging along. We were in UT territory and I knew the finish was soon. One thing I liked about this race is that you didn't have to do some foolish loop around nothing to complete the distance. You simply crested a little hill (or did you turn a little corner?) and there it was, the finish. You could see it, and that was it, the end. Yes. I plugged away at that minor distance and was finally there.

Two guys on big ladders stood right past the finish line to take pictures. I can order one for about $49.95! Good grief!

Cate was waiting in the big crowd at the finish and congratulated me and handed me a banana. Walking was hard for me at that moment. I remained pretty sore for the rest of the day, but strangely, never really felt sore after that.

We wandered the grounds at the end, eating bananas and clementines. We also got a nice photo taken of the two of us at the end, in front of the finisher's backdrop. Adam was waiting nearby with the car, so we found him and headed off to lunch.

Perhaps that's enough of a race story. I will say that we all took naps that afternoon and enjoyed a leisurely and eclectic and delicious diner chez Tisdale. I had an uneventful flight back home. Immediately after the race I was sore and exhausted, and nauseous, and said, no more half marathons. Now, 6 days later, I'm not so sure.

My time was about 2:11.
Cate's was about 1:57. Go Schwester!