Nashville Half Marathon Race Report

Good and bad on this one. Good Race, Bad Me.
Nashville which is part of the Rock N' Roll Marathon Series was definitely a hit! They did everything right from the Expo to the downtown run to the Starting Line to the Finish Line. It was well organized with plenty of water stops, cheering sections, and bands. BTW I only heard 1 country song - phew.. Thank -You! Mostly Rock N Roll! Nashville is a beautiful city.(not dirty like most.)

state capitol

symphony center

Athens Parthenon replica

Friday afternoon I hit the Expo along with a 100,000 others - Ughh!

placing time chip on shoe

The Stick

Me being silly

yep me being silly again

Now to the race. Race went off @ 7am for the elite. I was in corral # 17 out of #35. I hit the starter mat @ 7:33. Wow! If you don't already know,but the temps were 80deg @start and 89deg @ finish and full of sun! We've all been complaining about the lack of warm temps and BAM we get hit with HEAT!! in April!! It was trouble.

before race, all smiles

the kenyans

My goal was 2:15 and I stayed with the pace leader for most of the early race. I was pacing where I wanted to be, but mile 6 was where I noticed the temps . There wasn't any shade coverage since we were running through town. By mile 8 I was feeling queasy and finally allowed the pace team to catch up with me. We were avg 10:15/mile to that point and had hit the majority of the big hills. I just kept thinking if I could make it to mile 9(15kish), then there would be a hill repreave. As I passed the 15K mark, my stomach couldn't take it anymore and I jumped off course and behind a building and preceded to vomit/barf/upchuck/lose my guts(you get the picture) for the next 10 minutes. Every time I would get up to start again, the "dry-heaves" would start. I swear everytime I would "throw-up" I looked at my watch to see how much time I was losing. The overwhelming disgust set in. I finally got up and noticed I was 9 1/2 minutes behind. I started back slowly and stomach felt a little better. The 1/2 mile split was 14.75 minutes. I knew I lost any chance at a PR back at "vomit central" so I tried to make the most of the remaining race. My legs felt great, my stamina felt good, but I struggled with my stomach until the end. I managed to finish in 2:24:28. Which is precisely 9 and 1/2 freakin minutes off of my goal. This is tame today, you should've heard me yesterday.

You can never anticipate the weather. From 50 deg to high 80's in 2 days, go figure, just my luck... By mile 11 there was people lying all over the course, ambulances were scrambling. There was easily a couple hundred people lying on the sidewalks waiting for help, it looked like a M.A.S.H Unit. My neighbor who won the Knoxville Marathon 2 years ago said that she ran 25 minutes slower than last year.

tuckered out

enough energy to sneak a smile

TN Titans stadium

mile 26

I ran my second - half marathon in 5 weeks and am happy and feel accomplished for that. I would be lying if I said that I wasn't dissapointed. I trained for this, hit the hills often, and ran longer tempo runs. It just wasn't meant to be. Unfortunately I won't get the opportunity at another half until the Fall time. That sucks! I want redemption!!!

Stats:

4800 feet of elevation change!!

Splits  Elevation   HR

m1 10:13 +167 151

m2  9:46  + 91   156

m3 10:30 +436 158

m4 10:45 +160 161

m5 10:49 +162 162

m6 10:07 +96   162

m7 10:22 +413 165

m8 10:33 +120 167

m9 19:43!! +71 165 You would think my HR would've dropped after 9 mins down.

m10 11:52 +57 168

m11 9:58 +173 169

m12 9:50 +170 170

m13 10:00 +190 171(91% of max)

13.22 miles in 2:24:28