I tell ya… I’m hangin’ with the wrong crowd.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. So now that open water swimming is (almost) done (LOST in the Quarry next weekend!… see post below)… lots of the crowd are back in the pool… and some of the tri guys and runners are out playing in the road… fall marathon season is upon us! I’m in the latter group this year, although I’m going to try and keep a modicum of swimming in my repertoire this this, so it isn’t too hard to get back into it next year.
Anyway… today was the Oakville Half Marathon. And on Thursday I decided I’d enter it. A good tune up race for the Marine Corps Marathon I’m doing with my son, Dylan, on Oct 27… his first.
Interestingly, Dylan did almost the exact same thing as I did when my swimming career ended… he got into running. Problem is… he got into it with a bit too much gusto… (not that I’ve ever over-done anything!) and within a few weeks he had his long run up to 36k… coming from pretty much nothing. Which got me kinda worried… not that he’d get injured by ramping up that fast… but that he’d be kicking my butt in Washington. I needn’t have gotten worried… he got injured. Nice to see that not just the old guys get injured… the young and inexperienced can too. Well that was a load off my mind… now I wouldn’t have to bear the humiliation of him beating me on his first marathon (watch, I just jinxed myself!). I can prolong the Kent family ribbing… at least until his second one! Probably sounds a little harsh… oh well… he’s almost back in the game now! 😉
As for me, well I didn’t have much planned this year… a few races wherever they happen to land… a couple of Half Marathons early this year… a couple of Half Ironman… and Marine Corp. I was pretty happy last spring when I did a lifetime PB of 1:38 in the Miami Beach Half Marathon… only problem with doing a PB already this year is… it didn’t leave a lot of room to do a PB today.
Anyway… it poured rain yesterday… cats and dogs… torrential. I feel for the guys who did the 10k Toronto Zoo run… with part of it on trails too… but we got lucky. The rain ended and the weather was just about as perfect as you get for a fall run. About 10C… and a nice flat track… and home town race. Nice when you can sleep at home before the race and be sitting at the kitchen table 50 minutes before the race and get there with still lots of time to spare.
(Rob, Brad, Sandra, Mary & Andrew!)
As for the race… like I said, it was flat, fast and homey! (Nice to see Brett and Lamb out on the course cheering us on at about 8 different spots… I remember thinking “wow, they are everywhere… this will really be depressing if I find out they ran everywhere!). I had no pacing plan or anything and just wanted to go out and run it and see what happened… anything under my 1:38 PB would be awesome.
At the start I ran into Pete being the 1:35 Pace Bunny… and Patrick was going with him… so I thought I’d join in. Bad idea… I kept with them for about 3k… then realized that was a little rich for my blood… and let them go. But I ended up hooking up with a woman and we ran elbow to elbow… until the 13k mark… and I fell off pace again. It’s so nice when you find someone that is exactly your pace to run with and nothing is said but you both realize that you’ve got a good thing going… until you fall off that is. That hurts psychologically… and it’s hard not to beat yourself up… pack it in then. The nice thing about this race was I just fell off… but I didn’t die completely.
I was able to hold a decent pace in fact… and only about 4 or 5 people passed me for the rest of the way… which given my history of going out too fast and dying at the end… was pretty good. The last person to have the honor of blowing by me was a girl who caught me with about 500m left… nobody likes to get beat with 500m left… but there was nothing to be done about it… I couldn’t catch her. Now if you are wondering how all of this running ties into open water swimming… here it is… they announced her name as she crossed the finish line 10m ahead of me… Dominique Von Richter!… for those of you remember… it was her husband (and former Olympian) who won the LOST Race this year! At least I got chick’d by a fast runner!
Which leads me to my complaint.
I actually had a great race… I pulled off a PB by 2 minutes… 1:36!… couldn’t be happier. But man, I’m hangin’ with the wrong crowd. All the other LOSTies kicked my butt! Take a look at these Half Marathon and 10k times!!! Good job guys!!!
- Ron Merek – 1:23 – 20th overall… out of 811!!! Damn… that’s fast.
- Darren Osborne – 1:25 – missed his NYC qualifying time by 50 seconds! But still smokin’ fast… 26th overall and 6/144 in his age group!!!
- Scott Gay – 1:30 – 56th overall… and 5/78 in his age group!!!
- Patrick Hardy – 1:32 – 84/811… and 27/144 in his age group!!!
- Peter von Euw – 1:35 – bang on as usual… the best Pace Bunny in the business… I was surprised I was only a minute behind, I never saw him again after the 3k mark!
- Freddie So – 38:41 – for the 10k… first Master and 7th overall!!!
- Mike Riley – 40:53 – for the 10k… first in his age group and 13th overall!!!
- Rob Kent – 1:36 – the slowest fast guy out there! 110/811 overall & 35/144 in my age group… but not bad for a swimmer!
(Results… in case I missed anyone else! http://www.sportstats.ca/searchResults.xhtml?eventname=Nutrience+Oakville+Half-Marathon+and+10Km )
Great race, great day and lotsa fun!
Cheers,
Rob