Notes
This was a fantastic race-- I really enjoyed this one. It was small-- only about 100 racers-- which is super puny compared to any half marathon I've run thus far (but, this was only my third, and the other two were Miami LOL) Anyways, I trained for the past year to hit a goal of sub 1:45:00 in Miami this past January, and I came up five minutes short, crossing the plane at just over 1:50:00. The thing that really killed me was the heat and humidity, so I wanted to try and find a "redemption run" in the local area-- a half that was held in the same climate zone that I had been training in, on a similarly flat course, within a reasonably close time frame to my failed Miami attempt. The Veterun Half looked like it was PERFECT-- it was close to home, and on a race track. While it wasn't pancake flat, it was flat enough!
Everything clicked into place for this run. The weather was a cool 45 degrees, but sunny, it didn't start until 11AM, so I had a chance to sleep in a little, grab a decent breakfast, let it digest, and warm up before the run. The only detrimental thing was the wind-- there were 15-20 mph winds howling around-- but these were a blessing compared to the 60 mph winds we had the day before! I had a small Indian guy drafting me at one point in the race, while we raced directly into the headwinds. It was hilarious... and annoying! I knew he was definitely drafting me because I shifted side to side to see if he would adjust to follow... and he did! It wouldn't have been so bad if he wasn't so close... but I felt like he was almost touching me-- it was a bit too close for comfort LOL!
All in all, I was super happy with this race. I barely squeaked out my goal, and came in at 1:44:42-- but I accomplished my goal no-less!
Division Place: 4/12
Overall 14/104
Gender Place: 8/46