Sunday morning I rolled out of bed bright and early to get ready to head out the door to take part in the Philadelphia Rock'n'Roll Half Marathon I signed up for several months ago. After my traditional pre-race "meal" of a slice of whole-wheat bread with natural crunchy peanut butter and strawberry jam, I put on my running shoes, pinned my bib to my shirt, and headed out the door. The walk from our apartment to the starting line was about a mile away, but I made sure to leave with enough time that I could just walk there with a leisurely pace, rather than having to rush. After checking my extra gear (I had worn long pants and a light sweatshirt over my running gear since it was a little chilly), I found my place in the corrals, and was ready to run. Since I had overestimated my finish time by a rather optimistic amount, I set myself about two corrals farther down than the one I was supposed to be in. (Me, run a 1:45 half marathon? Not this year.) Given the large amount of racers, I officially crossed the start line about seven minutes after the official gun went off, but since the race was chip timed, the actual clock time was irrelevant. (This is something I actually really love about chip-timed races; when I ran my last half in April I was actually still in line for the port-o-potties when the race officially started; by the time I crossed the starting line I was with the last of the stragglers.)
The race itself was actually not too bad at all. We started near the Art Museum, ran into downtown, then back out through Fairmount Park before crossing the Schuylkill River and returning to near where we had started. The course was basically flat, and thus pretty fast. Since it was a Rock'n'Roll race, there were several bands along the route, which provided a greatly needed distraction (and mostly ear-pleasing music) along the way. My run went pretty well considering that my training was for all intents and purposes non-existent for this race. I think I did a couple of six-milers on the treadmill over the summer, along with my sporadic weekly 3.5 and 5 mile runs along the Schuylkill Trail. I had no expectations for this race; I just hoped that my resulting time wouldn't qualify as my worst. Somehow I managed to maintain an 8:30 pace for many of the miles; it wasn't until around mile 10 that the long mileage began to catch up with me. I took two couple-minute walking breaks during miles 10 and 12, and yet still I somehow managed to finish with a time of 1:56:05, which broke my previous personal record (PR) from April by just over a minute. Luckily it seems that the extreme month of cross-training I completed in August helped to maintain enough of a fitness level to successfully complete this half marathon. I wonder how well I could have done if I actually had trained for the run?! Guess I'll have to put that to the test next year.
After the race I met up with D and Leroy, who were waiting for me near the Rocky statute at the base of the Art Museum steps. We walked home, and D treated me to a homemade pancake breakfast. Perhaps the best part of the day came later in the afternoon, when I met up with an old friend from eastern Pennsylvania who happened to be in town to run the half marathon with a group of friends. We were housemates during our junior and senior years of college, but hadn't seen each other since graduation in May 2000. I have to say, for all the things I hate about Facebook, one of its positive aspects is the ability to reconnect with old friends. Though we hadn't talked face to face in over 11 years, our conversation flowed like we had just seen each other a day ago. It was great catching up over a glass of wine (or two) and hearing about where our lives had taken us over the past decade.
After thoroughly catching up and vowing not to let so much time pass before our next meeting, we headed our separate ways. I headed home, where I spent a low-key evening making up for all the calories I'd burned in the run earlier in the day. All in all, a great weekend, and an excellent way to usher in a new week.
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