Official results are in.
Clock time - 1:52:03
Chip time - 1:49:34 (it took me a long time to get to the start line)
Overall place - 719/3284
Gender place - 228/1920
Division place - 43/342
Pace: 8:33
I am wasted right now. Driving for 6 hours the day before the race, and then driving for 3.5 hours shortly after the race is not a very good idea.
I drove by myself to Moab on Friday and went to the race expo. I met up with Lori, which was really great. We had a nice talk while I ate dinner. She had already eaten but was kind enough to come sit with me so I wouldn't be total dork sitting there all by myself.
My husband and three youngest kids drove separately from me and left after school was out. They got there about 10:30 Friday night.
My legs were feeling kind of yucky from the drive to Moab and then I didn't sleep well because of being in an unfamiliar bed and anxiety about the race. I woke up with a headache. But things went fairly well once I got to the race. I rode the bus up to the start, and it was cold, but really not too bad. I've been to much colder races. They had hot chocolate, which I enjoyed. I think I burnt my tongue a little. You were supposed to take your sweats off and load your sweat bag on to a truck a half hour before the start of the race. I tossed my sweat bag on the truck about 40 minutes before the race and then ran the opposite direction from the start line for a 2 mile warmup. It much preferred spending that time running and getting warm rather than standing around in my shorts at the start line being cold. And then I felt like luck was on my side (I thought of felix felicis, or however it's spelled, from Harry Potter) when I stopped my warm up run 15 minutes before the start and was actually able to get to a port-a-potty before the race started. It got really hot once the race started. It was a very warm day. I was wearing a singlet and shorts and I was dripping sweat by the time I was done.
I tried to run around 9:30 pace or just under for the first two miles, on Bonnie's advice, but I was worried about making up that time later on if I wanted to do an 8:15 average pace in order to get the 1:48 that Bonnie predicted. I guess I took 1:48 on as a challenge. After the first 2 miles I tried to speed up and keep increasing my speed in small increments for the rest of the race. I didn't quite get the 1:48 that I wanted, but I was close. My splits, according to my Garmin, were: 9:24, 9:17, 8:57, 8:21, 8:21, 8:03, 8:08, 7:57, 8:00, 8:03, 8:08, 7:50, 7:44, and 7:48 for the last bit. Of course, my Garmin says I ran 13.18, not 13.1, so the average pace from the Garmin is a little different than the official results say. The Garmin says my average pace was 8:18, while the official results say 8:33.
People were passing me the first few miles, but then I started passing people for the rest of the race. I tried to really pore it on the last couple of miles and it nearly killed me. I really had to dig down deep to keep the pace up at the end. When I got to where I could see the finish line and people were lining the sides of the course, I was wondering how in the world I was going to get to that finish line. I was so glad when I finally did.
If I had worn my fuel belt and had drunk my own water/gatorade while running, instead of walking through 3 or 4 of the aid stations, like I did, I might have gotten that 1:48. Oh well.
I talked to a guy from the blog named Mark before the race. I was wearing a FRB singlet and so he stopped and talked to me. I'm not sure what his blog name is, so Mark, if you see this, please comment. | 