Hampton Half Marathon 2011 RR+PR

It was cold and super windy, flat with rolling hills!
I hear the course was pretty - I wouldn't know, all I saw was the butt of the person in front of me, luckily I had a lot of variety over the course of 13+ miles. Yes, I passed a lot of people!

Stats:
GARMIN: 13.29, 6:58 pace, HR: 184; 1:32: 42 (PR by 14 seconds)
OFFICIAL: 13.1, 7:04 pace, 1:32:43 3rd woman overall/850

Garmin splits:

Mile Pace HR
1 7:07 180
2 7:07 180
3 7:07 180
4 7:07 177
5 6:46 181
6 6:48 182
7 6:58 183
8 6:56 183
9 6:55 181
10 6:55 185
11 7:04 185
12 6:58 185
13 6:52 183
.29 5:23 186

So how did it go?
I ditched my race plan from the start. I felt strong, and I went for it from the beginning. I asked myself whether I could hold that effort for 13 miles and I felt like I could. I am glad I did not look at my HR, it was v high, as you can see (my resting HR is below 60 and my HR in a recent 5K was 182!), and had I known that, I would have slowed down. I feel I ran the race in fear, waiting to crash and burn. This winter I had a hard time doing long tempo runs and felt unprepared. However, it seems that my weekly races at Fresh Pond, on ice and snow, were enough to get me to run 8 sec/mile faster (Garmin comparison) than last year in March (my old PR).

I never crashed and burned, in fact, I feel I could have gone faster. The wind was certainly and issue (the cold never bothers me); more than that, it was scary to see a few miles of 6:4X so early on (mile 5), as that used to be my pace for 5 miles total at Fresh Pond, and I'd feel like death after. Next time I might not look at lap pace...

I can't think straight, I am super happy. This is a small PR by official results. However, my last PR was on a course that registered as an exact 13.11, while this one was 13.29. At this speed 8 sec/mile improvement in a race is huge! Most importantly, I do not feel trashed, and I know that in March I am going to start out a little faster, and hopefully do even better with better weather (no wind) on a more accurately measured course.

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In ending, I want to thank Jenn for her support going into this race. Who needs a coach when you have someone who knows exactly what to say and when to say it?

"Yes-everyone is going to expect you to run fast because you DO run fast and you CAN run fast! I expect you will run QUITE fast but regardless of what the clock says, my opinion of you and my belief in your abilities would never change! Bloggers and friends are great accountability as long as one doesn't allow them to become stressors instead of encouragers. (I'm more speaking for myself here-you seem to have this together!) Have a great race, run for yourself-BALLS TO THE WALL!" J

Thanks Jenn!