My Fourth and possibly First

Half-Marathon, that is. Half-Marathon that I finished without the need to see my doctor afterward. That is a major accomplishment, I must say. I don't think I was really ready to run a half-marathon, yet, but since I was kind of impressed how I finished the Bronx 10 Mile I thought it couldn't go that bad. I definitely did a lot better than in Brooklyn! I was sore, thanks to the hills, or in specific that ONE hill, and a bit dehydrated but I think I did okay. I expected a bit better than the 8 minutes per mile average pace but I really do not want to complain. Again, I want this to be the first half-marathon that does not make me run to PT again. I do have a bit of a persistent pain in my right quads but it is nothing compared to what I endured after any of the previous halves.

Chugging up the hill
Photo by MarathonFoto

How did it really go? It was hard. A lot harder than I anticipated. The details, as always, are in my Garmin Connect account. My plan was to keep the average pace at around 7:30 minutes per mile which I was able to do quite well for the first eight miles but then the big hill loomed. I didn't expect it. The course was different than 2 years ago and brought us down to the water for the 6 1/2 miles back to the stadium. Unfortunately, after running on the boardwalk for a while we were forced to climb around 100 feet over a mile, starting an hour into the run at around mile 9. That took the wind out of my sails and despite the following downhill sections I did not recover. I just made it somehow. Here are the splits, according to my Garmin. Due to the width of the road and the number of runners it was impossible to run the tangents perfectly.

1. 7:13
2. 7:15
3. 7:26
4. 7:19
5. 7:26
6. 7:35
7. 7:29
8. 7:43
9. 8:22  (this is where the hill started...)
10. 9:02  (... and it continued into mile 10)
11. 8:12  (luckily, there was downhill here)
12. 8:40
13. 9:42  (another hill)
14. 1:29

Photo by MarathonFoto

Just from these number you can tell that I suffered the last four miles. It is what it is. The Staten Island Half is definitely a race that requires a lot more preparation than what I was able to pull off. The route was scenic after around mile 6 1/2 when we turned onto the boardwalk all the way until around mile 10 when we went back to the road and at the end through some industrial neighborhood. The finish line was inside the SI Yankees' ballpark, which I thought was great.

I couldn't linger too long after the race so the way home was torturous. On the ferry I became nauseous and all the way home I shivered most of the time. I realized that I probably didn't hydrate myself enough throughout the race. My shirt was drenched and I only started to drink water in the last few miles and that only because I needed those stops to get through the race. I admit, I stopped and walked at a few and took my sweet time to drink. Another reason for the mediocre pace at the end.

That said, I'll run it again next year. I have to work more on my longer distances and get more mileage under the hood. My next half marathon is scheduled for January 24th, next year. It will be the Fred Lebow Manhattan Half, the first to maybe finally get qualified for the NYC Half in 2017. I did put my name in the hat for the 2016 version of it, though. Let's cross fingers and knock on wood.

Next race will be the Dash to the Finish line. I can do 5k just fine.

Until then, keep on running!