Notes
I managed to get up and out of my hotel at 3:00 a.m. from Virginia and made it to the starting line with plenty of time to spare, and then I ran 3:30 and change. Tons of fun.
I caught up to Larry Macon (who took the early start) and ran or walked at his pace with him for 2 or 2.5 miles or so, which led to a 1:54 split for the first half of the marathon. Once we started loop 2 I picked up the pace to catch back up to everybody I'd been running with earlier, so I wound up with my largest negative split to date with a 1:36 second half.
I'd considered slowing down so I could get another 3:33 marathon, but other than one little bump the last few miles are downhill and I don't like to slow down on downhills so I just ran it in.
Good time, and they had soft pretzels at the finish line.
After I finished, I waited until i'd stopped sweating, did the baby wipe bath, followed the not so great directions on the GPS for the 2 and a half hour drive back to DC, and managed to get to my gate at the airport 10 minutes before we boarded the plane.
On a humorous note, my roommate at hte hotel was the Delaware state rep, who normally works the Delaware marathon, but he came to Virginia to do the Marine Corps Half while I was driving up to do the DE Marathon. I found it funny anyway.