Went to bed early the night before, but hotel doors slamming all night kept me up till 11. And I was worried about jr at home alone (not sure which I was more worried about- him or the home), so my sleep time really suffered. I finally found some ear plugs at 11:00 and then got some sleep.
The course is nice and flat for this race, and this year was the best weather year yet! No snow, no rain, temps in the am were just around 40 (chilly just standing around), but warmed up to the 60's by the afternoon. Perfect running weather.
MR and I ran together. He ended up pacing us a little faster than I'd anticipated, and I was surprised that he didn't KO by mile 10, but that race adrenaline kicked in and he brought us both in with new PRs.
Our goal was under 2. Getting in under 1:55 was just a treat. I was happy all our miles but one were under 9mm. And that was the mile with the mile 10 waterbreak when I had to stop to walk to catch my breath, eat my gu, drink some water & spill pink gatorade all over myself.
Average was an 8:43 pace. I really tried to run good tangents, and for me, .08 isn't bad. Splits were: 8:34, 8:38, 8:40, 8:42, 8:44, 8:37, 8:56 (water/gu), 9:00 (water again), 8:42, 8:37, 9:14 (water/gu), 8:45, 8:19, and 7:33 for the last .18.
This was a great run, but I didn't "enjoy" it as much as I have in the past when I've just been running to have fun rather than running to meet a new PR goal. I missed a lot by staying focused on running instead of noticing the other runners, the beach, the gay dolphin store, etc.
And I guess there are 2 ferris wheels in myrtle beach now. I thought I was having a bad mind trip when I saw one on the run up ahead of us and I could have sworn we'd already passed it.
The after run food was great. chocolate milk, hot chicken noodle soup, the banana, orange, bagel, muffin & more tent, krispy kreme donuts that were waiting to be dipped in hot chocolate sauce and rolled in sprinkles (those were sooooo good), and of course the beer tent where MR had his beer & mine too.
We went back to the hotel, spent some time in the hot tub, took a nap, went for a 2 mile walk on the beach, and found our way to a Red Robin for some rootbeer float training time. He got in 4, and I managed to take down 3 with 2 orders of sweet potato fries. Needless to say, I was hitting the tums pretty hard by bedtime, but it was all worth it.
MR says he might even try a marathon sometime. He'll need his own medal rack soon if he keeps this up! My quads are sore from the run- not something I usually experience, but then I've never run 13 miles at that speed before, so I don't know what to expect.
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