Today was my tenth half-marathon, and the second anniversary of my first half-marathon on this course. Having run the Galloway Half Marathon in each of the three years, I'm a "streaker" and proud to have been involved from the beginning in this very well run race, on a nice course through midtown Atlanta. It's not a flat course, but for the distance, it's probably one of the best in metro-Atlanta in that the hills aren't too bad. There are two difficult sections, a 75 foot net climb in mile 7, and a 65 foot net climb in mile 10. Those are both mitigated by nice long gentle downhill sections before and after each uphill section.
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| Today's race route |
I broke the 2-hour mark for the first time in this race last year, and ran a nearly perfect race on a mild early winter morning, 48 deg F at the start. This weekend the weather has been colder, with our first freeze on Friday night. Several of the runners in half marathons today volunteered in the Westside race yesterday, and likewise some of yesterday's runners were in cheer groups for the Galloway half this morning. I volunteered yesterday morning at a combined 10K/10-miler on Westside Atlanta, directing runners through one of the route splits in 25 deg F weather. My fingertips and toes were nearly frozen after 3 hours, but fortunately I managed to thaw out by the afternoon.
Thankfully the temperature was a few degrees warmer this morning, which made a big difference in terms of comfort. I wore two layers, a short-sleeve runningnerds wicking shirt under the long-sleeve Inaugural Galloway 13.1 shirt from 2014, showing off my status from the original race. I also wore compression sleeves under cold weather tights, the Tucker Running Club cap, my favorite pair of Balega socks, and the Brooks Launch shoes that carried me to the finish line of my first marathon. I think that I'm not alone among runners in carefully selecting my running kit before a big race, both for comfort and for psychological meaning.
Before the start I saw Sheelagh O'Malley, who occasionally joins the Sunday morning run with the Tucker Running Club. She had run the 10-miler yesterday and was getting 16 miles total today including her warmup, virtually running a marathon this weekend. I'm impressed by people who can run two races on back-to-back days, particularly the longer distance races. I had outrun Sheelagh in the BuHi Half in October, but noticed that she ran yesterday's 10-miler in 1:25, 3 minutes faster than my PR for that distance.
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| Waving to Bonnie at the start. 13.099 miles to go! |
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| Smiling but cold at mile 5. Gloves on, long sleeves down. 100 feet in front of the 2-hr pace group |
I had carefully prepared a plan to match last year's sub 2-hour performance, and the pace group was helpful in validating my progress even though I didn't rigorously stay with the group. Shortly before the 9-mile mark, where we turned from Monroe Drive onto 10th Street, I reached the corner at 1:21, exactly on plan and matching last year's run. Today I had run a bit more consistently, a few seconds slower than last year on the downhill sections and a few seconds faster than last year on the uphills. I passed Bonnie again near the 9-mile marker, a 100 feet behind the 2-hour pacers, but still on track with my plan. After the 9-mile marker, we headed uphill on 10th Street, and I started to have trouble at that point. I had to let the pace group go at that point, accepting that mile 10 would be tough, and just trying to stay under 10 minutes. I passed the mile 10 marker at 1:32, and realized that I needed to run a 28 minute 5K to break the 2-hour mark, that meant a 9:00 min / mile pace for the rest of the race. That's not difficult for me to manage in a 5K or 10K race, and I was just hoping that I would have enough gas left in my tank. I knew that mile 11 would be a nice long downhill, and that was the fastest mile of last year's race. Indeed I managed to speed up in mile 11, although the pace group was still well ahead of me at the turn from Piedmont Avenue onto Monroe Drive past the north end of Piedmont Park. I had hoped to reach the corner by 1:38:40, today it was 1:39:20 when I turned the corner.
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| The last good mile was the ninth mile. Gloves off, sleeves still down. 100 feet behind the pace group. |
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| The last 5 miles circle and then enter Piedmont Park |
Entering Piedmont Park, I resolved to run as hard as I could manage, knowing that I needed to stay at the 9:00 min / mile pace even though the stretch through the park would be slightly uphill. Passing the 11 mile marker at 1:41 confirmed that I couldn't afford to slow down. But try as I might, my pace was slower than 9:30 min / mile. By the stage I was taking very few walk breaks, and keeping them short, ca. 15 - 20 seconds, just enough to give my pulse rate a short break. It seemed that I felt a lot better in this stage of the race last year compared with today. Approaching the 12-mile marker, I saw Bonnie cheering me on and taking photos. I cried out as I approached her, "Oh, the pain!" I was joking with her, as I wasn't really in pain, other than some psychological angst that the 2:00 finish might be slipping away.
I reached the 12 mile mark at 1:50:30. With only 1.1 mile to go, I doubted that I could cover that distance in 9:30, but I wasn't ready to give up yet. I ran through the Phidippides cheer group, feeling their positive energy but fearing that exchanging high fives would slow me down more than it would pump me up. I took a short walk break around 12.5 mile point, then tried to get back up to speed, resolving to run the rest of the way to the finish. I was looking for the 2-hour pace group on an out-and-back segment, and didn't see them although I couldn't believe that they were that far ahead of me. But I was starting to lose motivation at this stage. The thought even passed through my mind at one point about cutting one section that would have saved me a tenth of a mile, I couldn't believe that I was even thinking that, but fortunately I ran past the point of temptation and stayed on course.
Now it was time to run past the south side of Lake Clara Meer. I was pretty sure that 2:00 was completely out of reach. I was starting to let up on my effort, when from behind me I heard a woman's voice shout loudly, "Frank, you can do it!" It was Sheelagh coming up behind me. I think that she was surprised that she was able to catch up to me, but she was moving smoothly and still talking, whereas all I could do was to try to pump my arms a bit harder in response to her encouragement. I think that she was going to run with me to the finish, but it probably became clear to her that I would only slow her down, so she pulled ahead at her own pace. Fortunately that helped me to run a little faster, trying to keep her in sight. I made the turn at the Boathouse at 1:59 even, last year I reached this point at 1:58. As I was running along the south side of the Active Oval, I could hear the announcer saying something about 2 hours, 2 hours, and was feeling an acute sense of disappointment that I had failed to finish in 2 hours, 2 hours. But I just kept pushing myself to the finish. As the clock came into view, I saw 2:00:45 on the clock, and now my goal was to try to finish around 2:01:00 on the clock. Unfortunately my vision was better than my running, meaning that I could see the clock from further than 15 seconds away from the finish, and I actually crossed the timing mat at the finish line around 2:01:01 on the clock. I momentarily felt quite beaten up after accepting my medal, but quickly recovered as my heart rate dropped toward a more reasonable level.
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| Neither cold nor smiling at mile 13. I rolled up the sleeves around mile 10. |
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| The face of disappointment, a little slower than last year. |
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| With Anna Calcaterra and Sheelagh O'Malley. Anna won the master's women's title in this race! It was nice of Anna to wait around for me to finish 20 minutes later! |
I quickly recalled that my typical times have been 2:02 - 2:06, and that today's race was my third fastest half marathon out of ten 13.1 races to date, and decided that was pretty good, being only about one minute off of last year's time. I thanked Sheelagh for encouraging me to finish strongly, in fact I think that I probably would have finished about 30 seconds slower if I had been on my own.
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| With Bonnie after the race. I'm smiling so I had obviously gotten past the disappointment of missing the 2:00:00 goal. |
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| With Jeff Galloway, 1972 Olympian (10,000 m) and winner of the inaugural Peachtree Road Race in 1970 |
8:53, 9:03, 9:01, 9:18, 8:44, 9:05, 9:42, 9:13, 8:58, 9:55, 9:00, 9:44, 9:25, and 55 seconds after mile 13 on Garmin to get to 2:00:56.
Half marathon history to date:
1) BuHi Half, October 2, 2016: 1:56:08 (12.85 miles measured), 1:58:40 (13.15 miles with a little running past the finish line)
2) JG 13.1, December 13, 2015: 1:59:48, PR on a certified course
3) JG 13.1, December 11, 2016: 2:00:56
4) Publix Georgia Half, March 20, 2016: 2:02:03
5) Teardrop Half, May 17, 2015: 2:03:09
6) Publix Georgia Half, March 22, 2015: 2:05:36
7) Hotlanta Half, August 23, 2015: 2:06:49
8) JG 13.1, December 14, 2014: 2:19:36
9) Hotlanta Half, June 12, 2016: 2:21:17
10) Thrill in the Hills (trail race), February 20, 2016: 2:26:38
When things get a little tough in a race, I should never forget that four years and 50 pounds ago: walking a few miles was a difficult workout. I couldn't run a single mile.
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| Chatting with Simon after the race. |
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