What a wet run! It rained the entire time. It was either pouring down rain or sprinkling, but there was never a break! We all got especially wet because the start time was delayed by 10 minutes while they re-routed part of the course. And, around mile 11-ish, we encountered the mess–the path was flooded, so we had to move back up to the street.
Up until the detour, I had been pacing along with a couple of similarly-paced gals — we’d been alternating taking the lead with one another for several miles — and, at the big flooded mess, I lost my lead. It’s funny how just a couple of seconds can really set you back! I eventually caught back up again (the two gals were never more than 15 feet ahead of me, but it took many minutes to catch up!), but I never stayed ahead; we just resumed our trading places situation. I don’t think any of us was actually competing with the other; our paces were just very, very close (well, I know I was just trying to keep with them and wasn’t consciously trying to pass either of them).
Also, quite luckily, at the detour, one of the gals knew where we had to jump back onto the trail. If she weren’t there, I don’t know where I would have ended up (we had to call out to the guy that we had all been previously following as he was continuing along on the street)!
When we got back on to the main trail, I stayed behind that gal because I didn’t want to be in the lead and take everybody the wrong way. Once we got back into Vasona, the third gal had gotten about 20 or 30 feet ahead of us. I caught up to the gal closest to me and we decided we would try to catch up to the 3rd gal together. We were going at a pretty good clip. I had estimated that we were only .7mi away from the finish, but I think it was longer (either that, or I was really tapping out fast). She told me that I should go on ahead, but we managed to stay together–over the bridge and into the parking lot. In the finishing chute, I found enough strength to sprint through, so I ended up crossing the finish line before her.
I didn’t feel like I was particularly slow, but apparently, I was! It was a tough run, though. Plenty of hills and coming back was a net uphill. And, I had to run with my t-shirt in my pocket (picked up swag bag and bib only this morning and I didn’t have time to bring the bag back to my car). When I fished the shirt out of my pocket at the end of the run, it was HEAVY and totally soaked through. I was totally soaked through, too.
Running in the rain was ok, aside from having to splash through a few ankle-deep puddles. It was finishing that was bad. That’s when the cold set in! I was freezing and I didn’t stop shivering until well after a nice, hot shower back at home. I guess I like rain–and it was wonderful to see so much water in the river and to even see a few waterfalls — but I don’t like freezing!
Anyway, overall, a very good run for the marathon training cycle. I am a bit slower than I had expected to be, but I’m ok with that.
Overall: 67/222 (30%)
Overall Female: 23/121 (19%)
Female (age group): 6/35 (17%)
Clock Time: 1:52:57
Chip Time: 1:52:52