Weather reports all week suggested that Sunday would be great. Yeah, right. DH and I arrived in Providence around noon on Saturday (having detoured through Manchester, CT to pick up bread at the Great Harvest Bread Company - they offered to ship bread to me in the future - yeah!). First stop was City Sports on the edge of Brown University. DH scored a pair of the new Asics Nimbus 10's. I'm waiting until I can try on a women's wide in my size before shelling out the big bucks. We stopped at the runners "expo" (I use that term loosely) at the Johnson and Wales Harborside campus to pick up our packets and T-shirts (nice short-sleeve New Balance tech shirts). The high point of the "expo" was the sample of Willow Tree chicken salad (yummy stuff). The expo consisted of half a dozen tents set up on the lawn. We got a free bottle of water from Pizzeria Uno. Then on to our downtown hotel which happened to be within walking distance of the Cheesecake Factory. We had a late lunch/early dinner (heavenly Dulce de Leche cheesecake......) and then retired to watch the Kentucky Derby. Go Big Brown!! DH was up before the crack of dawn Sunday but I managed to sleep until 6:30 - when the oatmeal was scheduled to arrive. I think all of the runners must have ordered early breakfast as ours didn't arrive until nearly 7:30 - almost too late for me to eat before a 9:00 race start. Notice I said almost - I almost never turn down a meal. Fashion report - black Brooks shorts, black FUG, red Sugoi singlet, aqua Sugoi rain jacket, black Asics waterproof hat, red and white Asics Nimbus VII's, white socks, white wristband, clear sandwich baggie for my Garmin. Remember that "clear and nice" weather report?? It was in the mid-40s and drizzling Sunday morning with 100% chance of rain between 9:00 and 11:00 am. DH and I hoofed it over to the downtown mall around 7:50 to catch the shuttle bus to the start line. There were droves of people waiting for the buses, and not nearly enough buses were running. We made it to the Johnson and Wales campus about 5 minutes before the scheduled start only to find a couple hundred people in line for the 15 porta potties. All of the men streaming from behind bushes and dumpsters should have been a tip off that something wasn't right. People were even lined up at porta potties at an adjacent construction site. DH and I ran further into campus and found the student rec center open - it had nice, warm, line-free toilets. We barely made it back to the starting line where it had started to rain steadily at 9:00. We stood there for 10 more minutes - presumably waiting on some of the delayed buses and/or porat potty lines. By that time, inhibitions were thrown to the wind and both men and women were running to a vacant lot next to the start line to relieve themselves. There were no announcements, no starting gun, no National Anthem, no thanking of the sponors. The race just started on some imperceptible cue and we were off. The course was much hillier than expected. I had intended to go very slowly the first couple of miles and slowly ease into race pace, but the first half mile was up hill, and my heart rate was already cranking close to 170 before the end of the first mile. I tried unsuccessfully to slow down. The aid stations were poorly marked, and I missed the first one. It was only two tables long and on the right, and I was on the left side and passed it before I realized that it was a water station. The second station was already out of cups, but I managed to wrestle a full bottle out of the hands of the lone volunteer at that station. That was my only stop for the entire race. The rain stopped in the first 3 or 4 miles and I was able to put my Garmin back on my wrist - also took off my jacket and tied it around my waist. There were some substantial hills, but my Cape Cod experience helped me resist the temptation to charge them. I just kept it steady up the hills and let loose on the downhills. I thought I was going to finally beat the 2:00 hour mark, but my final time was 2:01:16 - which is still a PR by over 3 minutes. The water was all gone by the time I crossed the finish line, and there were no snacks as best I could tell - fortunately, I had remembered to stick a $20 in my pocket, and there was a 7Eleven close to the finish. How can they run out of water 2 hours into a race - expecially when there is a simultaneous full marathon? I'm hoping they were rationing and still planning to put more water out for the marathoners. Final stats: 666 out of 1386 runners; 12 of 69 in my age group (would have been in the top 10 had they used net time in lieu of gun time - guess I should have lined up in front at the start ;-). This was an inaugural race, and hopefully they learned something and will work out some of the bugs before next year's race.

Sue, it sounds like a tough day from both the weather and organization standpoints. Glad to see that at least you got a new PR out of it, and can save that sub-2-hour achievement for a more pleasurable event. It sounds like you're close enough to it that running under better pre-race and hydration conditions would put you over the top. By the way, why did you keep your Garmin out of the rain? They're supposed to actually be immersible, so it seems like a bit of rain wouldn't cause any problems for sure.

Thanks SR, Doug and nonoruns! Doug - yes, the Garmins are supposed to be moisture proof, but they aren't submersible like the Polars. Mine started taking on water last year during a torrential rainpour on the Kal-Haven trail. My DH "baked" it very carefully in the oven and managed to remove most of the water. I stupidly wore it again during a subsequent lighter rain, and it leaked again. The baking, again, got rid of most of the moisture. I'm trying to avoid having to repeat the baking again - I figure I've just been lucky that it hasn't killed the watch already. nonoruns - Providence is definitely a cool town. I will definitely have to find time to get back over there. SR - put that dollar on my tab - I'm sure it won't be my last faux pas ;-). Actually, waiting at the start was not all that bad. I've never run in a cap with a bill before, so it felt like I was dry - well dry other than my squishy shoes....

Nice race and thanks for the report Sue. My sister and I were supposed to run this race as we both live about 15 minutes away. She got stuck at Wellesley Univ. in Ct. watching her daughter in her softball tournament, so I stayed away and after your report I'm glad I did. I was quite surprised at the lack of organization as the race director does the CVS 5k every year with 5-6,000 runners and has his act together for that race. Hope they learned from their mistakes! Fran

That sounds like such a poorly organized race! Do they have any specific way for runners to give them feedback, or do you just figure they know what they need to improve on? Sounds like you should email the race director, if you haven't already. Hard to believe they were out of water and food at the finish after two hours. I'd be tempted to ask for my entry fee back. Despite the weather and poor race planning, sounds like you ran a good race, and got a PR, too! Congratulations!

Whoa Sue! I hope you headed right to your favorite ice cream place as a reward for dealing with all that stuff! As Wildchild mentioned, try to get some "constructive" feedback to the RD. First time events are sometimes a crapshoot. But you got a PR out of the deal, and thats something to celebrate! Congrats!

Sue, I'm not surprised your HR was up at the start, with all that running about, from the late porridge to the porta loo lines. Anyway off you went and didn't even get a drink at the first stop, yet you manage a pr and are well placed. You did great Roy

Very impressive to PR on a tough course, with limited support, and poor weather. You should be quite happy with your performance even though that of the RD was way below acceptable.