Notes
Volunteers screwed the course up, so this was NOT a half marathon. They cut off 4/10th by missing the turn on to Vaughan & then Danforth, by sending us directly to Clark St from West St. which is why no one saw the 4 mile marker.
So figure my adjusted time would be: 1:36:00 Flat. I had enough in the tank to finish off another .4 in that time, so I would have PR'd either way. The heat factor makes the ,4 almost a wash in my book.
Tried to run the first third a little conservative with the hills and what I figured would be climbing temperatures. Tall Dave was lurking about 10 seconds back of me most of the way. As I noted, never saw the four mile mark, but thought something was amiss when we passed the 5 mile marker and the watch was off by .4miles and stayed that way the rest of the race.
Saw a few heat casualties, but all in all not too bad. Light breeze helped. Thought my left hammy was going to cramp up around mile 6 but I ended up running through it and it was forgotten by mile 8. My stomach was a little queasy on the last third and I stuck to water most of the back half. With 2 to go, I was convinced that this time would be meaningless in terms of a half marathon PR and backed off a bit. Sub 1:35 would have been ideal, but at this point I knew the course was messed up in some way. Dave reeled me in a bit with maybe a half mile or less to go, but I had plenty left for a good kick. Crossed the line in 1:33:10, happy to have it in the books. My son and his girlfriend finished together about 15 minutes later and seemed in good spirits. For them they were the longest runs they have ever done, so congrats to both of them. If I can stay injury free, we'll take a legit shot at sub 1:35 sometime in the future here for the half.
For now, I am counting this as my 20K PR.