Philadelphia Distance Run 1/2 marathon

Sunday morning was the Philadelphia Distance Run - a half marathon race around Philadelphia. There were about 10,000 runners signed up to run on Sunday and it was a great day for a race.

I wasn't sure how to approach this because I had run a new PR two weeks ago at Virginia Beach and I'm doing the Breast Cancer 3-day this weekend so I wasn't sure what my legs were ready for on Sunday. I decided to just let my body do the talking and kind of wing it and not care about my performance. If I wound up walking the whole time, so be it. Just make sure to have no injury or sore spots for the 3-day.

I got into my corral (one ahead of Brian) before the start and spotted my most hated race nemesis who I always see at the big local events. So much for walking at the start -- I need to get in front of the nemesis and stay there! Before the gun went off I decided to try something new and I ate a gel before we started. I thought this might help to counter the mile 11 bonk effect I felt at Virginia Beach.

The first two miles feel good, if a little warm. They made me worry that the day would heat up and be tough but luckily that never happened! Between miles 2 and 3 things were pretty lively as a guy was leading the E-A-G-L-E-S cheer over and over again as he ran. With the echo coming off the buildings that was pretty fun. I think that kind of wiped him out though because he faded as we made the turn onto the parkway and I never saw him again.

I made it to the 5 mile mark near the Art Museum before the winners finished the race so that was a minor accomplishment for me! Yay! At this stage, I'd been running the whole time except at the water stops. I felt really good and I was a couple minutes ahead of my Virginia Beach pace. Yay again! I ate my second gel at this point.

The stretch along West River Drive (now Martin Luther King Drive) was pretty good, I started more of a run walk along here but it was still mostly running. Brian caught me close to the 7 mile marker and while he acknowledged that he was probably going too fast, he felt good and wanted to maintain his pace. I let him go, knowing that it really wasn't worth it to me to push things any harder than I was.

Just past mile 8 there was a Power Gel station and here is where I nearly met my doom. I stopped streatch a little while I ate the gel and made sure that I had enough water to wash it down and that stop could have been bad. My IT band, which had been silent to that point, suddenly freaked out and hurt like hell. It even hurt as I walked, and that NEVER happens to me. I kind of freaked. I got off the road and started to walk on the grass which was a little softer and stopped a couple times to stretch it out. Back on the road, I decided to try running again and since it hurt equally to run and walk I decided to keep on running. We crossed the bridge onto Kelly Drive and by the next mile marker I had forgotten the pain. (For now anyway)

The rest of the race was total run walk and I was still pretty far ahead of pace from VA Beach. At Boathouse Row, which was past the 12 mile marker, I saw that if I really pushed it I could probably break 2:30 but my knee was hurting and I was a little scared of hurting myself for the 3-Day so I just maintained the status quo and finished in 2:31 and change.

I was really happy! That's about a 3 and a half minute improvement over Virginia Beach. I also managed to beat the race nemesis by quite a lot -- like 40 minutes.

The medal they gave out at the PDR was excellent! A very cool replica of the LIberty Bell. It may be my coolest medal ever. Anyway, I was pleased to see that Brian had finished ahead of me and was waiting at the line for me. He managed a totally awesome 2:25 finish! Amazing! now I have a goal for 2006 -- to beat his 2:25 time!

The race was really good and fun and when it was over I got to meet Deena Kastor, the Olympic Medalist and winner of the race. She set the American Record on the road on Saturday and she hung out and was signing race bibs and medals. It was very cool.

So here we are on Tuesday and my legs are in good shape and I'm trying to get in the right frame of mind for the weekend. I'm a nervous wreck, that's for sure.