Sunday, December 11, 2016

Race Week

5-9 Dec:  None!  Oh so ill...
10 Dec:  Tucson Half Marathon

I took Monday off of work because I was too sick to go to work, and on Tuesday I was still feeling like garbage, so I schedule an appt with a provider.  I couldn't clear or hear anything out of my right ear, and it hurt pretty badly.  I was diagnosed with a bacterial ear and throat infection.  The provider prescribed antibiotics and prednisone to me, and after two days of taking the meds, I felt a lot better.  I'm so thankful that she diagnosed me.  I could have been miserable for a long time.

I debated whether or not I should still take 9 Dec off work to pick up my race packet and chill out since I was sure I wouldn't be running the race.  Colin thought it would be nice to have a day off together, so we both took the day off.  We went to the expo and had a good time hanging out.  I was feeling a lot better, so we debated the pros and cons of actually running the race...  I knew the race was well supported, and I felt like I could at least walk back to the finish line under the time limit.  And since I had run the 10 miler pretty easily the other weekend, I decided to go ahead and run it.  Plus the prednisone had been keeping me awake and only allowing me to have 4-5 hours a sleep a night anyway, so chances are I would already be up.

So I got everything ready and went to the race.  It went pretty smoothly, and although I felt a bit sick, I really felt like I could run for two hours and be ok.  So I lined up in the very back of the pack without 30 other people.  The gun went off, and two minutes later, we started the race.  My plan was to run the first 10 miles incredibly easy and then see what happens from there.  I also kind of wanted to see what type of huge negative split I could rack up.  I just didn't want to get hurt or become even more ill.

I took two potty breaks during the race (which helped my negative split cause!).  I think I ran too slowly because my legs hurt like hell.  I think if I had opened up my stride, I would have had a lot less knee and hip pain.  It's hard to figure out what the cardiovascular price would have been, given the fact I was still getting over my infections.  I finished the race at an accelerated pace, but definitely not all out.  I feel like I could have run another mile or two at that pace.

Splits:
10:43
11:50 (potty break!)
9:48
9:52
9:40
11:52 (potty break!)
9:34
9:39
8:58
9:16 (not sure what happened here)
8:55
8:38
7:59
:58
TOTAL:  2:07 and change

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