Notes
Not a lot of pop in the legs going into this morning, felt a bit concerned that I should have done a true taper to avoid this fatigue. Rain on the way down to the Cape but stayed dry and overcast for the race. Temps were pretty good right around 60 although 50s would have been great.
I wanted to do a half marathon this fall as a fitness test as well as a chance to take a solid effort at this distance as my previous PRs were not really in line with what the pace charts suggest I should do. This seemed like a good race to pick as it is relatively close (mother in law lives one town over) and they added a pretty big prize purse ($1,000 for winner, paying down to top 5 spots). I figured with the money, I could walk away with a nice paycheck or at least have enough faster runners show up to pull me along. I had considered Hartford and Newburyport as well based on the field size around my goal pace but took a chance on Harwich, which I knew would have some hills.
I was not expecting this many rolling hills over the first 6 miles. None were big hills, but there were enough that it wasn't a flat fast course. None were terrible and they did help change the pace up a little. The last three miles also had some more hills, including a pretty rough stretch over mile 11.
Back to the start of the race, it became pretty apparent that I was not going to be in the running for a top finishing spot. Some of the guys doing strides looked pretty quick and sure enough, there were at least two guys who went to the Trials (serafini, ashe) plus some of the other usual suspects from the grand prix circuit who are at the top of the leader board (glarius rop, amos sang). They might as well have been running a different race. The 6th place finisher (1:08:xx) also raced a 5K the same morning in 14:xx).
The gun went off and I was quickly outgunned. I held back a little letting the lead pack pull away and I was still going 5:20 pace, way ahead of the 5:35 I should be running. The lead pack went and then a BAA guy (ashe, who must have been doing this as some sort of recovery run) and a GBTC guy (who was making his half debut) pulled past me and I let them go as well. That left me sitting in 10th place after about 1/2 a mile and the lead pack was already gapping me. After a fast first mile, I intended to stick to the 5:35s.
As I mentioned above, the first 6 miles are a lot of little ups and downs which keep things interesting but don't help crank out super fast splits unless you were in the lead pack. Surprisingly, despite my dead legs the past couple of days, the first half of the race felt fine, just clocking in relatively even splits. Around mile 7 or so I could see trouble ahead with GBTC starting to fall off pace from Ashe. I took this as my only opportunity to do any sort of racing today and reeled him in over the next mile before catching and passing him. That was my only interaction after the first half mile with any runner the entire race. Ashe continued to pull away from me and I continued to pull away from anyone behind. Despite the number of fast runners ahead of me, it was a very lonely race, pretty much a solo run the entire way which kind of backfired my whole plan of working with a group.
By mile 10 I started feeling the fatigue and at that point it was just a matter of fighting the pain to keep the pace as best as possible. Mile 11 has some pretty good hills which was a challenge and my pace suffered. I held it together and tried to claw back over the next mile but still gave a few more seconds back. Ashe was still way ahead in the distance (at least somewhat in view but clearly nowhere close) so there was no adrenaline rush to catch anyone. Mile 12 came and went leaving a last mile with a few mini rollers over the last stretch of bike path. The finish couldn't come soon enough as I was starting to get gassed.
It was a bitter sweet race. I PRd hitting 1:12:39 per the official clock but was humbled by the super fast runners ahead of me. I talked with a few of them who were basically saying they are each doing full marathons over the next two weeks and this was pretty much a tempo training run for most of them. Must be nice being that fast.
I would like to think that if I had a group to run with or had a flatter course, maybe I could have hit 1:11:59 but who knows. In either case I'm happy with the results and I was badly in need of getting a quicker half time. Felt surprisingly good after the race.