2008 Mercer Island Half Marathon Race Report
Michael Horntvedt
It’s already March and I’ve completed the Mercer Island Half Marathon for the second time. I signed up for the race quite awhile ago knowing that it would be a C race that would not get a lot of preparation attention. That is very uncomfortable for me, but it was the way things had to be. My early season has been riddled with injuries and I was forced to slow down, reduce mileage, and listen to my body with rigor. In doing this, I’ve not had any tempo level running prior to the race.
I woke up early (4 am) because Joy, my wife, had an early call out for a flight. I stayed in bed to continue resting, but sleep did not return. I was out of bed at 5 am for my first cup of coffee a little chit chat with Joy and some oatmeal. I puttered around the house, did some JFT2 writing and then gathered up my things. This was a very calm morning. Similar to a group run morning. I left the house at 7 am so that I could get a parking spot in close. No problem. I parked in the Community Center lot and made my way inside.
I wandered downstairs for a sample of Cliff Bar (banana) and to see who else was wandering around. The walkers were sent off at 7:30, so I went down to the start with camera in hand and shot a couple of pics. Funny how people get funny with a big camera pointed their way. I like that.
The team started to show up around 8:00 AM and then continued to show up until about 8:20. Amazing turnout. I was chatting with Blake and noticed that he had 4 gels strategically placed inside the sleeves of his long sleeve shirt. He had precise times when these gels were going to be ingested. Hmmm….I ran to the car and grabbed the Cliff Bloks I brought. I had two blocks about 15 minutes prior to the race. I had a case of the pre-race-gotta-pee-too-lates and found myself in a line much too long to get in before the race started. I decided to get to the start and wait it out.
After many delays, the gun went off. I found Steve who was right on Bruce’s heels. We ran together for a short distance and then I decided that the pain in my bladder was not going to subside. I zipped ahead, peeled off into the woods and relieved myself on a tree. I lost about 1 minute from that little detour. I got back on the road and felt much better. My goal was to catch Steve and Bruce. I started that by running very fast. Mistake. I slowed up a bit in an effort to lower my heart rate to something reasonable (165 bpm). All of my training has been at or below 150 bpm, so 165 was still a push.
Things were going well. I had dialed my HR back and kept it in the 165 to 170 range for about the first 5 miles. I popped two more Cliff Blocks to stay ahead of any energy dips. I young girl caught me at mile 5 and asked how long we’d been running. We chatted a bit and then she started to pull in front of me. EGO. That damn thing gets me in trouble far too often. We had the long steep downhill right after mile 5 and per my race plans, I let gravity pull me down that hill and past the girl. I looked down and saw my HR at 170 going downhill and knew I was pushing harder than I should. I pushed my lap button for the first time at mile 5.
I felt pretty good for keeping that pace, so I did. This was 1.5 miles earlier than I typically pick up the pace. I still knew that I had 1 minute to make up for the pee time and I forgot that this was a C race.
I kept trading places with the young girl. She’d pass me up the hills, I’d pass her down the hills. It was a good chuckle each time. We reached that big hill at about mile 11 and I heard here coming. I gave her a high five and let her know I’d see her at the finish line because this was a long hill and she’d put a lot of distance between us. She laughed as she ran away. I also had somebody pacing off of me for the last 5 miles. He stayed within a distance I could hear his footsteps and breathing. Incentives to keep running.
I couldn’t muster any more speed. I was hanging on to keep pace. My last mile was extremely painful and I knew that I had gone out too hard too early. At the bottom of the last hill, Mr. Drafter passed me. About half way up that little hill, I decided he wouldn’t get the glory of crossing the line first. I picked up the pace and got by him to finish at 1:38:34.
The table below shows my HR and pace for the various sections of the run as well as my cumulative pace/time.
|
Time
|
Heart Rate
|
Distance
|
Pace/Mile
|
|
Section
|
Cumulative
|
max
|
avg
|
Miles
|
Section
|
Cumulative
|
|
0:38:25
|
0:38:25
|
171
|
164
|
5
|
0:07:41
|
0:07:41
|
|
0:14:54
|
0:53:19
|
174
|
170
|
7
|
0:07:27
|
0:07:37
|
|
0:14:23
|
1:07:42
|
176
|
174
|
9
|
0:07:11
|
0:07:31
|
|
0:07:37
|
1:15:19
|
175
|
172
|
10
|
0:07:37
|
0:07:32
|
|
0:07:03
|
1:22:22
|
175
|
172
|
11
|
0:07:03
|
0:07:29
|
|
0:07:44
|
1:30:06
|
176
|
174
|
12
|
0:07:44
|
0:07:30
|
|
0:08:56
|
1:39:02
|
185
|
176
|
13.2
|
0:07:27
|
0:07:30
|
I was 6 minutes slower than last year for this race. This was because of the lower amount of endurance training and a lack of tempo training. It was also a tougher course. I also aggravated another injury that’s been looming in the background for awhile. I have a case of High Hamstring Tendinopathy. It is a pain that emanates from the point where my hamstring attaches to my sits bones. More care.
