26.2 Miles for Donna

This past weekend, Tilda, Kenny and I made the journey down to the Sunshine state. After a Friday morning run in Amelia Island, we set up shop on the beach in Neptune Beach, FL and hung out. It was such a fun time and Tilda had a blast people watching and playing in the sand.

Saturday we traveled to Saint Augustine which is the oldest continuously inhabited European settled settlement in the US. There's a fort right in midst of the town that kind of reminded me of a smaller version of the one in Old San Juan, PR. It was also built by the Spanish but over one hundred years before San Juan's.

We had a fun time walking through the narrow alleys of Saint Augustine but I couldn't help thinking that, in true Florida fashion, the whole area felt 100% touristy. While Charleston, Savannah and even Boston have elements of touristy sections, you know that locals also inhabit those spaces and go to those places. Here it seemed it was only tourists. Which is not always a bad thing, but could be felt in the number of people stopping mid-stride to take a selfie that will likely be edited into near nonrecognition. 

A bit out of the town, we got off the beaten path a bit with a short boat ride to Fort Matazanas which guarded the "back entrance" into Saint Augustine. It is most notable for the Spanish massacre of French Huguenots which is actually where the fort got its name. During the ride, the wind picked up as the temperature dropped so we opted to skip the self-guided walking tour and instead head to San Sebastian Winery for  a wine tasting. 

After tasting too many sweet wines, we headed back to our hotel for an early night(Tilda's sleep/wake cycle dependent). 

Side-Note: In true, amazing wife fashion, Kenny did everything in her power short of smothering to keep Tilda quiet which lead to probably the best night sleep I've had in ten months. So I cannot sand-bag with sleep deprivation for once. 

Shady Shade Shade

The weather was calling for an overcast race day and they were right. Shade was out in abundance. We were staying at a hotel about a mile away from the start/finish line. I thought that I'd be able to park near the start but the whole area was blocked off. There was a brief moment that I consider jogging to the start but swiftly called an Uber instead. This lead to the first encountered with shade.

Uber Driver: "You're doing the race?"

Danny: "Yeah, it starts in about an hour."

Uber Driver: "So you're driving to go run?"
Danny: "Errr yeah, well it's a long run."

Uber Driver(pointing out his side window): "Those people all look like they're running too."

Danny: "Errr well...."

Then he proceeded to drive past the start line and drop me off about 1/2 mile away from the start. I got a slightly shorter walk and my first taste of shade of the day. 

A thing about this race. It is first and foremost a race to support Breast Cancer research and honor survivors. Really more of celebration of life than a race for most of the runners. It was great to see so many people out supporting a good cause and bringing in lots of research funds. But that being said, even though there were several thousands runners there were only a handful of "racers". 

One such racer was Tracy McKinnon of Harbison Trail Runners fame. He'd just run a 40 mile race the weekend before so he was as fresh as he normally is for the race. In typical sandbagger fashion, when asked what his goal was, he replied just finish to cross another state off his list(he's currently at 16). 

Spoiler Alert-Tracy beats Danny and takes first Master overall. 

As the gun went off I got sucked up with some of the faster half-marathoners and went through the first mile about 30 seconds too fast. I quickly backed off to a more manageable(or so I thought) 6:30 pace which I ticked off with good regularity for the first half marathon. It was so nice having Tilda and Kenny cheering me on the first half. I got to see them three times in the first 11 miles and the smile on my face probably lasted a mile after each time seeing them. But the second half had no opportunities for me to see them and right around then, as I passed mile 16 and the furthest I'd traveled for over a year, the wheels started coming off.

But unlike a high speed crash, this was more like an accident that may occur at any shopping plaza in Florida on any given day, slow motion collision between two cars driven by what appears to only be 10 knuckles. I refused to walk and my body refused to run. I half jogged half staggered the last six miles, going from 4th place to 8th with less than a mile to go. And then comes Tracy.

Running beside me so effortlessly(apparently unaware we had just traveled, on foot, for 25+ miles), he looks over at me, says "I thought you'd be already drinking a beer by now" and then passed by so quickly that he ended up beating me by nearly a minute.

	Elapsed	Split	Split Pace
5K	20:16	00:20:16	6:32
10K	40:04	00:19:48	6:23
15K	1:00:36	00:20:32	6:37
13.1Mile	1:25:33	00:24:56	06:33
16.2Mile	1:45:57	00:20:24	6:35
20Mile	2:13:56	00:27:58	07:21
23Mile	2:37:20	00:23:24	07:48
Finish	3:02:55	00:25:34	07:59

As you can see from my paces, those last few miles were "slightly off-pace".

Immediately after finishing, with Tilda in my arms and Kenny by my side, we headed to lunch then back for awards as I still finished in 9th place and first in my age-group. The awards were presented by none other than Joan Benoit Samuelson, the Olympic marathon champion. She asked me what my finishing time was and when I told her, she replied: "Oh I want to run a sub 3:03 at Boston. I'd like to run faster but at least as fast as 3:03". 

As if that wasn't shady enough, apparently she told Tracy she'd like to run sub 3:02! Nothing like a little shade to make you laugh after a long painful run.

Interestingly, I've run 3:02-3:04 at each of my marathons in the last 4 years but this is the first I didn't come in 8th. I guess it's a sign that things are a-changing.

26th State completed

12th consecutive year of qualifying for Boston(first was Manchester Marathon 2008)

Until next time,

Danny