well, don’t tell me I am late, at least I am doing it!

The week started with a lot of work and then a few very busy days at the PreParty (which is what we call the “expo” or where you pick up your bib). As it’s a Brooklyn race, it’s natural that we’d roll over to the good ol’BK to pick up the bib. The promenade has changed a lot in the last few years and it’s totally worth the trek. That building with the green top is where the Preparty is. Nice views, right?

I spent most of my time at the Running Lab, which is where the Pacers are (we have all those pace bracelets for people, and also where the Course Strategy is held, basically, the funner area but I am totally biased!

Fun times at the preparty, plus you get to see everyone… The first day, my friend Courtney showed up right on time to come back to the Upper East Side together, so after she put up with my course strategy, we got a shot and headed back!

The next day, the husband picked me up. They have some food trucks parked there so we stayed a bit, enjoyed the mac and cheese and Airbnb set up and obviously we had to get the crazy pics…!

Race day…

We got up at 4, I had my breakfast:

At 5 we were in an uber to the start, got there around 5:40 and we had plenty of time to check our bag and get to the portapotties and corral. There was a fun flash rain for about 10 minutes which came out of nowhere. Then we just huddled in the corral.

More people started showing up…

Soon enough, all the corrals merge, the national anthem happens and we get moving. Time to run!

Patricia, Courtney and I started together. We all train together and finished within a minute from each other in the United NYC Half, all between 1:36 to 1:37 so we knew we could at least start together. The first 2 miles were crowded and we all stayed close. I felt Patricia pulling up and Courtney pulling back, and by Mile 3 Patricia had gone ahead and peeled off.

I saw so many people cheering it’s not even funny how many shout outs I got. Even from runners. This lady in white and black top is Katie, who I just met on that mile, she was doing great! I knew Helen would be around the 10K mark with her 4 month old Leo so I made sure to keep an eye out!

My pace in the park tends to be quite conservative, but it was a bit on the slow side. I had no energy. I had brought only one gel with me and wanted to eat it so bad by mile 3, but if I did, what was going to happen at mile 9 or 10, or 11…? so I saved it and kept trucking, slow trucking, and hoping for the best. I had no idea why I has spent, but… looking back about now, I realize that I didn’t taper enough, I had run too many miles that week or 10 days before the race and should have rested a bit more. I need to pay more attention to the mileage I do before races, it’s very easy for me to overdo it.

Around mile 7 or 8, when I left the park, I finally had a gel. Felt so good…!!! The second part of the race is always great. I love it. There’s a lot of space to run free, lots of people cheering, lots of teams cheering and I made sure I got high-fives from all of them.

The last miles are always fun. You can run hard + you realize the race will be over soon. Why does this always happen? I always feel like the race ends too quickly!!!! As slow as I was going, it still felt too short!

Boardwalk running FTW! Also, before you get on the boardwalk I remember seeing the 800 meter to go sign… what a THRILL!!!!!!!

Why does no one look happy in the last 200 of a race? it’s the most exhilarating part of the race???? did you all go out too fast by any chance??? I’ll do the digging below…!

Done!!!

Oooops: 1:40:01 WHAT?

Patricia was 1:39 and Courtney was 1:41 so we all had a similar day, AGAIN. Now that I’ve looked back at my training log I see what happened, way too many miles that week!!! Also, I didn’t eat enough. I usually do 2 cups of rice but didn’t finish it that morning… Note to self: please pay attention!

We all had stuff to do (travel, weddings, etc) so we hopped on the first train back to the city. As usual, it gets crazy and stinky in there!

So, here’s the splits. Disregard the messy laps. I usually manual lap at the race signs but I had it on automatic mile lapping (which I usually turn off) and it made a mess. But it’s all there. No hiding.

I did some serious negative split but still there was no way of getting back to a 1:36/1:37… Glad I didn’t fizzle out though. That’s just too painful (for my body AND my ego!).

Stats Time!