OK, since there have been requests heres a short report. After a horrible death march at the end of Chicago in 80 degree heat (though I still BQ'd by 1:01), I contemplated running a winter marathon to basically improve my corral position and maybe get a PR. I eye'd CIM, but that was too close. I put my name on the waiting list at Houston but was in like 7500th place. No shot. However, someone over on RW.com posted they had recieved an entry and offered it up. I was lucky to get it so I signed up the Sunday before Thanksgiving. I had good training (minus cutting my foot open the Tuesday before Thanksgiving) up until the 10 days before the race when taper madness set in. Felt like crap half of the taper and became very unsure of myself. Had no idea how I would do during the race. However, once I got into Houston I felt OK and decided I would "go for it" and try for sub-3. Race morning was warm 58F at start (before sunrise) and finish was probably in mid 60s and very sunny. It got very dry at the end of the race. I took 2 servings of UltraFuel at about 445-500am to fuel up. Sucked on some pretzels and had about 10-12oz of gatorade about 10 min before start. (Last solid food was about 6pm the night before). Course is relatively flat. Not Chicago flat, but flat compared to New York, Boston. A lot of rolling hills when you come to overpasses and underpassed. Especially over the last 6 miles. Miles 20-25 were out in the open sun also. Got near the 3 hr pace group and stayed with them for about 12 miles. Towards 12 miles I saw I had a slight shot at a HM PR so I picked it up a little. Missed the PR by 20 seconds (1:29:23 half split). Then ran with a couple of guys and used them to break whatever wind there was. The water stops were a little short and confusing. Not as giganticly long as in Chicago or the mega-races. I had a blister pop around 16.5 miles. Just came on in a couple of steps and hurt very bad. Limped for a while until the pain basically went away. Samething happened on other foot around 19.5 miles. So gimped for a while until pain went away. (My shoes were bloody when I looked down after the race). I'm a little angry at myself since I played it safe basically from miles 20-26. I guess my fear of the wall in Chicago caused me to go conservative and not lay it out on the line. I didn't want to blow a big PR, however it would have been nice to break 3, which would still have been a long shot. I would say it was a 97-98% effort as I was able to pick it up in the last part of the race. My splits are in my log, as you can see, I was able to pick it up the last 0.35 (Garmin) to 6:22 pace. I passed 16 people the last 7.6 miles and 8 people passed me. I basically ran with no one the last 3-4 miles as you can see in the results. The next person in front of me was 40 seconds and I think the person behind me was like 20+ seconds. You can see me finish on video at chevronhoustonmarathon.com. My bib number if 1016. This marathon was a good marathon there were things I liked and didn't like. Likes: 1. No need to return chip. 2. Putting name on bib (Large letters) 3. Ability to get up close to front at start (7 seconds to get across start) 4. Start/End in same location (hotel was nice and very close) 5. Warm weather in January can't beat that. 6. Crowd was pretty good nothing like Chicago, Boston or NY though 7. You get a lot of stuff from this race. A T-Shirt, a finishers T-Shirt, A mug. They feed you a full breakfast after the race with dessert. They actually weighed me the day before and after the race. Pretty nice medal. 8. You can watch yourself finish on line. Dislikes: 1. Water stops were a little short I guess. 2. The course starts on an expressway, when you come off the expressway you are in a very poor section of town with boarded up homes. 3. Though it is labeled as flat, it is super flat. End is rolly and lots of over/underpasses. Definitely hillier than Chicago. No where near Boston/NY though. 4. Can get iffy weather. Can get warm. Though this wasn't perfect is was way better than Chicago. 5. Not enough split mats. I like every 5k. some pictures http://flickr.com/photos/lilmoonies/3210739643/ http://flickr.com/photos/g2boojum/3210101596/

And I meant to mention, if they have to send you through a sketchy neighborhood at least they did it while your legs were fresh. It would be tough to run for your life at the end of the race, but then again that might help you to PR....

Hopefully I'll be able to start running soon though. Maybe tomorrow. I hope to run fast at the SC Half though I don't know how fast so close to Boston. I might try to run a little under sub goal-MP for that race. Hopefully it will be a little warmer this year. Also, if training is going well I'll probably run KP 15k also... Just have to sign up for both of them..