The Results are In!

After all my worry about a cold, wet run in this morning's Denver Rock and Roll Half Marathon, I woke this morning to see stars in the morning sky. Then I almost missed the race messing around thinking I had plenty of time before realizing the wave start was at 6:55 not 7:55! But I was able to find a parking spot five blocks from the start/finish line and had a nice warmup run to my spot in Corral #2.

Elvis could have stayed thin like this guy if he had been a runner and eaten more beef insteaad of Peanut Butter and Banana sandwiches. Did he know takes four times the calories (670) to get the same amount of protein from peanut butter as you get from one serving of lean beef (154)? This guy does ('cause I told him)!

With little time to think about what I was doing the race started. I felt like the first mile was very slow, weaving in and out of the crowd of runners. But when my Garmin Forerunner buzzed signaling the one mile mark it showed 7:54. I felt good so kept moving at the same pace and my next six miles clocked in at 7:44, 8:00, 7:58, 8:08, 7:51 and I crossed the halfway mark averaging sub-8s.

Then I started playing the mental games that always seem to plague me, alternating between thinking I may be able to finish with a new PR (1:46) to saying, "there's no way you can keep up this pace for another six miles." I think the negative thoughts won out over the next few miles and I slowed to 8:10, 8:11, 8:09, 8:21, and 8:49 (although I'm not sure this is accurate because my Garmin was showing two-tenths ahead the 11-mile marker and only one-tenth at mile 12 -- I think mile two was short and mile 11 was long).

At this point I almost gave up on a new PR until I finished the next mile in 8:06 and my Garmin was showing 1:38 with one miles to go so I kicked it up a notch and finished the final mile in 7:51 and the final .1 at a pace of 7:01 (downhill sprint to the finish!).

My official time was 1:46:43, just 43 seconds off my PR but more than three minutes ahead of my goal and crushing my previous best at altitude (2:08:52 in the Arby's Rocky Mountain Half in 2007) by over 22 minutes!

Smash Mouth rocked the party at the finish line in Denver's Civic Center Park.  

1:46:43 was good enough for number 842 out of 8,939 runners (top 10%), 551 of 2,941 men (top 20%) and 53 of 307 (17%) in my age group (M45-49). I am very happy with those numbers but most of all I felt good, had fun and the sun was shining as Smash Mouth took the stage at the finish line party! The bands along the route were nothing special given all I had heard about how cool Rock and Roll events are, but Smash Mouth made up for it great set of All Star, Walkin' on Sunshine, I'm a Believer and a Van Halen medly including Runnin' with the Devil.

All-in-all it was a very good day (even my Chiefs won).

Ride On!

Daren