Gasparilla Half Marathon

Time: 1:35:36
Overall: 165 out of 3901
Age Group: 16 out of 219

After Disney my training never really got back on track so although I’m disappointed in the results they aren’t surprising.

It was really nice to walk to a race start. Unlike last year, I left myself with plenty of time to hit the toilets before getting to the start. It was a chilly morning but with a long sleeve tech shirt and a sweatshirt I wasn’t too cold. I was able to get close to the start line which meant less bobbing and weaving at the start. The roads were a little congested but I still kept a steady pace over the Davis Island Bridge which was a first. Even with all of that I still started with a quite slow 7:19.

My goal going in was to run 7 minute miles. If I had a slower mile I wouldn’t try to make that up on the next. With that in mind I ran my next 2 miles a 7:00 pace. Although I felt good I had the feeling that I was pressing it too much. Listening to this ‘Marathon Voice’ resulted in my pace slowing which I never recovered from but more on that later.

An interesting thing happened just before mile 4. A police car was driving down a side street, drove onto the course and blocked a street that everyone was turning on. A lady quickly got out of the car and told the runners that they were turning on the wrong street. I was 7th in the group that was directed toward the correct route. We joked that we were now the race leaders. It was shorted lived though because after our turn we saw the front running were back on course by the time we reached them we fell in right behind so nothing gained or lost.

There were nice crowds through miles 6 and 7 but the bridges and tight turns forced my pace to slow even more I was able to pick the pace up a little for mile 8 but I struggled with miles 9-12 with each over 7:20. Mile 13 I gave a conservative “all I had left” and managed to get it under 7:10. There was a really nice crowd at the finish and I ran hard but nothing close to an all out.

Overall I was a little disappointed with my performance. It wasn’t unexpected but I know that I could have and should have done better.