This morning I ran the Atlantic City Half-Marathon in 1:32:43 (7:05s). I came in 54th place overall, 39th place of 408 males, and 10th place of 119 people in my age group! 10th place! Woo-hoo! I ran the race with Elizabeth Corkum, who invited me to the race. She did impressively herself, running the 13.1 miles in 1:39:39 (a PR for her!), equating to 7:37s. She came in 95th place, 28th place of 492 females, and 10th place of 139 people in her age group!
We both were 10th place in our respective age groups!
Here are the overall Half-Marathon results. And here are the Garmin deets from my race:
Unofficial Race Results:
For this race, the starting temperature was around 50 degrees with mostly clear blue skies. It really was a fantastic weather to start in. My first mile on the Boardwalk was a swift and painless 6:28. From there, I was slower in my miles but not very slow. According to Garmin I did 7:04s and a lot of my times hovered below 7:04 through 8 miles. After then I started to lose a little steam, heading back on the Boardwalk but for a monotonously long distance (well, 3 miles), slowing to hover around 7:15s. Still not bad, but I had a 2x Caffeine Tangerine PowerGel around Mile 10 or so to give me some oomph.
As I took the turnaround just around 11.05 miles and headed back, I saw Elizabeth and put out my hand to high-five her and give her a cheer of support. Yea! My run to the finish was supposed to be the steepest part of the run, but I didn’t notice any kind of incline. I was pretty taxed though, and while I saw the finish from quite a ways away, I didn’t muster up that much of a finishing sprint. I did get a little sprint on … well, maybe just a little of my “showy” robot arms.
How did my body do? No pains to report! I took an ArginMax, quercetine, and ibuprofen, and a green tea complex was also in me. I also had one of the aforementioned PowerGels about an hour before the race as food. About the worst injury I got was chapped lips from windburn–the course was generally windy, though the winds were calm at times. My calves are pretty sore, though, and it’s a little tough getting up from a seated position.
Overall, I’m pretty encouraged by this finish time. It’s not a personal record, though it is 7:05s. 7:05s is somewhere around where I want to be for marathon pace. While I wouldn’t be able to carry that speed today over 26.2 miles, I’m positioned in a place to know how I can perform in race conditions up to the distance of 13.1 miles.
It was a great trip! Thanks for inviting me, Elizabeth! 🙂