Carlene & Jacquie’s Excellent Half-Marathon Adventure Web Site!
Oct 24/01 — Carlene: CIM half-marathon
Training summary
Oct 8 - Off (Drive from North Bay to Kanata)
Oct 9 - Off
Oct 10 - Club run - 5K
Oct 11 - Run with visiting Penguin Paul P - 5K
Oct 12 - Off (Drive to Toronto)
Oct 13 - Run 15 minutes along Lake Ontario
Oct 14 - Canadian International Marathon/Home Depot Half Marathon (Drive from Toronto to Kanata)*********************************************
In my last journal I signed off by asking for Penguin prayers on race day. Well... I'm happy to say they were received loud and clear. Thank-you to everyone for sending them my way. I had a great race and set a new PR. However... let's start at the beginning...
Friday I drove down to Toronto in a torrential downpour. I felt like Noah sailing my ark however, instead of 40 days and nights of rain I had over 400 km of it. (Turns out I was blessed with this experience again Sunday during my return trip.) I spent Friday night at my sister's place stayed up too late talking to her.
Saturday I got up and ran 15 minutes as instructed by Jane (my coach). This was just long enough to get warmed up and work some kinks out but not to get tired. After that I headed downtown to the host hotel to meet up with the Penguins. We had a loose plan to meet there around noon. I got lost on the way there and was a bit frazzled by the time I arrived. Penguins David Gegear and Kathryn Lye managed to find me and then we spent the afternoon getting our packets, talking with Jeff Galloway and shopping. Glenn Gabriel joined us for dinner at a FABULOUS Italian restaurant and later we were joined by Tracy Gilliam and his friend who were on the way home from an Argos (football) game.
(Shortly thereafter the next table was filled by extremely beautiful women who turned out to be the Argos cheerleaders. If we could book them for the Penguin conference we would. I'm sure it would increase registration significantly. However, I really don't think we could afford them.)
My coach had suggested that my goal time for this race should be 2:11. When she emailed that to me I read and re-read the message and generally cowered in fear. I really couldn't wrap my mind around that time. My 1/2 marathon personal best time was 2:26:29 (May 2000). That race was a 12 minute improvement over my first 1/2 marathon the year before. Dropping another huge amount off my 1/2 marathon just didn't seem possible. I spent a lot of time pre-race trying to grasp that number and convince myself that it was possible. Let me tell you - training my mind was harder than training my body.
Sunday morning Kathryn, Kelly, David and I took the shuttle buses from the host hotel to the start area, checked bags and did the porta-john line. Then we began to walk towards the start. Turns out we were still walking to the start line and the race was about to start. Kelly, Kathryn and David suggested I run along ahead so that I could get in place. (I was on the wrong side of the timing mat at this point.) So I ran ahead, and squeezed on to the course.
My plan for the race was to line up with the 2:10 pace bunny and see how things went. I managed to get into the crowd behind the 2:15 bunny but figured I could try and catch the 2:10 bunny as the crowd thinned out. Then we were off. People kept telling me this race was flat. They lied. I never did catch the 2:10 bunny but I strove mightily to keep the 2:15 group behind me. I ran the entire race by HR and know that I was in the low-190's for some of the hills early on in the race. Somewhere around 10 or 11 K I was really discouraged and feeling really fatigued. I began drinking Powerade in addition to water. This helped a bit. It also began to rain which made me feel a bit cooler. During the second half of the race my overall goal was to keep my heartrate around 180 (or above). I am pleased to say I managed this.
Towards the end of the race it was really hard seeing the people walking back with medals. Finally I heard the bell and began to look for Glenn. Got cheered for, had my photo taken by Glenn and then was off to finish my race. Imagine my surprise when I rounded the final corner and finally saw the finishline clock and realized that - if I kicked I could finish in sub-2:11 clock time. Finished, hit my watch and then I saw the 2:10 pace bunny. I had finally caught him (he was 2 minutes early). I collected my rose, medal, food, etc and then wandered back to join Glenn and cheer for more runners. Soon David was waddling towards us and then Kelly. I don't know where I found the energy but I ran back down the course and ran with her for a bit and she looked so fabulous. It was wonderful. My final time and new PR is 2:10:10 (chip time) - an improvement of 16.5 minutes. WOO HOO! What a wonderful pay-off for all my hardwork trying to follow Jane's wonderful training schedules.
After the race Kathryn (who DNS and dropped out somewhere along the way) sweetly drove me back to the hotel, waited while I got changed into dry clothes and then drove me to lunch with the Toronto Penguins. We had a great time at lunch and I have to say I had such a wonderful weekend. Thank-you so much for being such wonderful hosts and for supporting me. In particular I'd like to send huge Penguin flipper hugs out to Glenn, Kathryn and David who went above and beyond the call of duty before, during and after the race. Thanks for reading and sending those Penguin prayers my way today.
Carlene
Still grinning in Kanata-30-
Previous Carlene journal: North Bay run, Oct 10
Next Carlene journal: Cross-country hardware!, Nov 7
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