#runlb

The Long Beach Half was last Sunday. I did not get a PR. But I did keep a steady pace, which is the same pace I hope to keep for the 26.2 miles of the NYC Marathon. I also got a nice, big Beach Cities Challenge medal for running the Surf City, OC and Long Beach half marathons consecutively this year.

The Long Beach Marathon home page has a link to the race results that displays your race time in a pretty cool way. Hopefully the link works.

From this link, it shows that I finished the half in 2:26:47, which equates to about a 11:12 pace. Overall, about 48% of all the runners finished before me, but in terms of women, only about 37% finished before me. Not bad. I am not an elite runner, but its nice to see that I am right about in the middle of the pack. My husband ran the full marathon and finished with an 11:15 pace. That put him in at 4:54, which was a PR for him. I just want to break 5 hours for NY, so I hope that I can come in right at that pace.

I used this half as a training run for NY, and as we are about 3.5 weeks out for NY, I am really nervous that I haven't prepared enough. My longest runs have been 16 miles, although I am aiming for a 20 miler this Saturday. I just hope I can get through it. I ran 7.4 miles last night at a 10:45 pace, and felt pretty good. The weather has finally cooled down and I can actually head out for a run right after work.

I had a blast at the Long Beach Half-Marathon on Sunday, October 7, 2012!

It’s so hard to believe that all this training and planning has lead up to this single day. I think it’s all worth it! The week leading to the marathon, I decided to take it easy on the running due to knee pains from my ten mile run the week prior. I don’t regret it at all! I had a lot on my mind on the eve of the marathon, but somehow things worked out right before I headed to bed. I finally slept around midnight with a wake-up call at 3:30am the following morning. I didn’t have too much problems getting up, especially since I went to bed with my marathon clothes on. I mean, you should always be prepared right? Good morning texts started coming in at 3:50 a.m. and we were on the road around 4:20 a.m. I live roughly 18 miles away from the race so it was a quick drive at that time of day.

We arrived at Lot 3 across the street from Lincoln Park in the Civic Plaza of Downtown Long Beach. The morning crew consisted of my boyfriend Timothy, running buddy Brian, and future naval serviceman Gilmar. Of the four who had trouble sleeping, Gilmar didn’t have a wink of shut-eye that night but still came out to support Brian and me. Bless his heart for his dedication! We made our way down to the race area near the Marina and the Rainbow Lagoon. This place is very iconic in my memory because I had taken many pictures with the Marina as my backdrop. The cyclists had already started lining up at the start-line for the 26.2 cycling race at 6 a.m. There were a mixed of cyclists in the crowd ranging from tour de France hopefuls, family of bicyclists, and just plain out silly folks on bikes. One group had inflatable duck floatation devices strapped to their helmets. There were a few false starts but it was exciting to see all the blinking lights of the bikes taking off as the sun rose around us.

After the cyclists thinned out, I went to the UPS check-in and stored my bag of goodies. I really liked this system of belonging check-ins because it was well organized and staffed by volunteers. I finally met up with my mom, brother, sister, and her boyfriend, who made the 45-minute drive at 5am. I was glad to have them come out to support me, despite the rising price of gas and the early wake-up call. We took pre-marathon pictures and exchanged good luck hugs before I left to find the wave I would begin with.

Brian and I decided to take Wave 5 because we wanted to take this race slower. There was no way that we could have survived running at a 9:00/mile pace the entire half marathon. We settled for something more do-able and within our reach.

As we waited for the waves to start, I took a shot of GU energy gel in Tri-Berry flavor because I was feeling a little groggy. Boy, that was the worst decision ever. I started getting jittery waiting for our turn. The gel was gross without water to wash it down. 35 minutes into the start of race, it was finally my turn to cross the start-line. We lingered onto the right for our photo ops and we continued onto a loop that took us around a bend leading to the onramp of the 710 freeway. We circled around and we ran towards the Ports of Long Beach. Along the way we passed by waving spectators and volunteers. I really enjoyed seeing the Fireboat offshore sprouting water and the lighthouse on the hilltop.

I loved the varying geography along the marathon route from its urban downtown buildings, the seaports, the beach, and back into urban sprawl. The last 3 miles had to be the worst. Muscle fatigue was setting in and Brian started having knee pains. We jogged slowly to keep our momentum but at some point, Brian wanted to start walking. He had allowed me to go on without him for a short distance, but sure enough I saw him right behind him pushing through the pain.