I signed up for this race because my friend and training partner Monique had decided to run it. I had done most of the weekend long runs with her as well as other regular weekday runs. The course covers country roads near Gettysburg as well as some miles on roads within the Gettysburg Battlefield National Park. It is a moderately hilly lollipop course that starts with a mostly uphill mile and a half, which means the last part of the lap is downhill. Noticeable climbs also came around the 5 mile, 7 mile and 11 mile marks. The full marathon runners did the same course twice and were started about 10 minutes before the first wave of runners doing the half.
It was a cool, breezy morning following a rainy night. The temperature was low 50s at the start and the sky was mostly cloudy. We started in the second wave of runners. I adopted the same time goal that Monique had - finish under 2 hours.
As expected, the uphill start was a challenge and my breathing was sounding louder to me than seemed good so early in a two hour run. But it was something to be accepted as a warm up. My watch recorded the first mile in 9:07, faster than I intended this early. The race followed a pattern that is typical of training runs for Monique and I. She tends toward a faster pace and I tend to lag behind holding a slower pace, maybe like an anchor. Monique would look back regularly and slow a bit until I caught up.
Early in the race we passed a lady running with a note pinned to the back of her shirt saying this race was her 100th half marathon. We also saw the race photographer and tried to look good as we passed. At various places on the course people were at the side of the road watching, cheering. Some seemed to be at their homes, others had driven out to support their runners. I think it was around mile 4.5 that we saw the marathon leaders coming back, already in the second half of their first lap. During mile 5 or 6 we entered the lollipop loop part of the course.
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| I'm wearing blue shirt, left background |
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| Monique and I frame white shorts guy |
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| Early miles, smiling is easy. |
The rolling hills continued. Midway on the lollipop loop was an out and back section where we saw runners who were ahead of us coming back. We saw a local friend Anna around here. There was a gradual downhill on the "out" and uphill on the "back". There was a timing mat at the turn around. Our mile pace had fluctuated by 20 seconds or so per mile depending on the terrain, as fast as 8:50 and as quick as 9:14. I was increasingly feeling like I was running on the edge of being able to hold pace.
We passed a pair of young ladies wearing matching shirts to celebrate a birthday. One shirt read "Birthday Crew" on the back; with "Birthday Girl" on the other. I wished her a happy birthday. Eventually around mile 10 I told Monique I wasn't sure whether I could stay on pace for the 2 hour finish and that she should not wait for me. Gradually I drifted back to about 50 yards behind her. As we covered the hill climbs prior to the final downhill, twice I yielded to the feeling that I needed to walk. Shortly after one of these breaks, our friend Jill was coming out in the second lap of her marathon. Her happy greeting and smile gave me a lift in spirits for the effort still remaining. I did some estimates of how much my pace could fade without missing the 2 hour goal. I was thinking about surrender.
Finally it seemed the climb was over and it should be downhill to the finish. As is often the case, there was still more uphill in this section than I expected based on coming out the same road earlier. I tried to press the pace a bit and switched between thoughts of "it's only x more minutes" and "I don't know if I can hold on". Focusing on running now rather than what still remained allowed me to hold on. Monique was still in view but I was not gaining on her. Eventually I entered the final stretch and could see the finish line. I decided against racing anyone who would pass me or trying to chase anyone down before the finish.
And I crossed the finish line in 1:58:45. Monique had finished 15 seconds earlier.
Mile splits per Garmin: 9:07, 8:50, 8:50, 8:59, 9:04, 9:14, 9:04, 9:12, 8:54, 8:55, 9:16, 9:32, 8:41, 8:22(0.14 mile)
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| Monique 1:58:30 |
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| My time was 1:58:45 |
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