Notes
I had a pretty reasonable goal going into the race. Primary goal was to go for a PR and the means was to try to hold my heart rate around 170. I had a rough idea what my splits were from last year (link) and was hoping to try cut 5 seconds off of every split. So, the plan was to go 0-4 (6:15/mile), 5-9 (6:00/mile), 10-13.1 (6:10), which would give me a 1:20 and change. I stepped back the training this week because I felt like I needed it and I thought it was worthwhile to try to get in a solid race effort on fresh legs.
I've had three straight relatively poor sleeping nights, so i didn't feel great this morning, and this carried on into the warm-up. Felt like I was dragging during the warm-up. Hooked up with Flash, Renee, and Jared and booked it to the start line with a couple minutes to spare. I spotted John Barrett and caught up with him shortly after the start; he said he was going for sub-1:22, so I decided to stick with him. The first mile was pretty comfortable, but I started to feel the effort midway through the 2nd mile and let John slowly pull away. The first hill wasn't bad, as I tried to maintain effort going up the hill, and then coast on the downhill. Stumbras and Chris George pulled up to me on the next climb and I worked together with Chris to get up the hill, although he was breathing way too hard this early in the race. I could feel my effort level getting away from me, so I pulled back just short of the top of the hill and let Chris and then Stumbras pull away. The first 4 miles were trending towards the slow end.
The neighborhood section was interesting. This is usually a long gradual downhill section and I'm used to picking up a lot of time from mile 4-8. However, I just couldn't find a good comfort level here. I was trying to keep Stumbras in striking distance, but the low 6:00/mile felt harder than they should have. At this point, I was mentally prepared for a long day of racing. By now, Chris was slowly pulling away and receding out of sight. I took a gel at around mile 5.5. Somewhere between miles 6 & 7, the gel started kicking in and I quickly reeled in Stumbras. He said he felt like he went out too fast and I told him I was feeling pretty warm. A group ahead consisting of Lara and another BAA runner gave me another target to work towards, and I thought it might be a good idea to make contact with them once I hit the windy section. A pretty tall guy in a Boston Community Running (BCR) jersey pulled up next to me, so we worked off each other to reel them in.
For some reason, things started getting inexplicably easier. I can only pinpoint the gel. I reeled off a series of sub-6 miles along Cove Road and I finally caught up with Lara's group just as it was beginning to splinter into two. There was moderate headwind along this stretch as I continued working with the BCR runner. Soon I found myself breaking wind for the group and I was surprised that I was still feeling good. However, I knew mile 9 was a notoriously tough stretch. I'm beginning to suspect that mile 8 is short and mile 9 is long on this course. As usual, it was not fast, but I was feeling great, but also dreading the wall of wind as we made a left turn. To my surprise, it was perfectly calm! I commented to another BAA runner next to me (think it was Carly) how weird it was with no headwind. I continued cruising along until mile 11, fully expecting that I was going to slow soon. At mile 10 (1:00:46 split), the thought crept in that I might be able to break 1:20! Also, both Jon Barrett and Chris George were within sight and It seemed like I was gaining on them. So I focused on them instead of the clock and tried to make up ground.
By mile 12, I had cut the deficit on Chris to about 50m or so and right on cue, he craned his neck about 5 times and tried to encourage me on. I buckled down and tried to reel it in, but it just wasn't happening. The effort of the previous 5 miles was beginning to show, so I focused on my turnover and just tried to get to the McDonalds that marked the top of the hill. By now, I was sure of a sub-1:20 and was just trying to stride out and get to the finish line. Alas, I couldn't pull even with Chris, but I didn't care because I had miraculously run a sub-1:20!
In retrospect, I have no idea how I pulled out this performance. I didn't think I was in shape to run a sub-1:20. My training has been wildly inconsistent this winter and I felt lousy during the warm-up and into the first half of the race. Yet, I ran a massive PR and was exactly 2 minutes faster than last year. So my wild-ass-guess at my half marathon pace Friday night on the treadmill turned out to be spot on. This was such a breakthrough performance for me that my predicted race times off this time are faster all distances except for the mile and shorter.