Monday, March 16, 2015

March Madness Half Marathon - Sunday March 15, 2015 - Cary, Illinois




The race season has begun.  I was instructed by my coach, (Heather Collins, modeling the sweatshirt above) to treat this as a training run, not a race.  Since I ran the race with her I sort of had to follow her instructions. 

It was a good thing I did as the last half of this course has a number of hills (not something we have a lot of in Illinois) and by taking it easy for the first six miles, I was able to run the hills without difficulty.

Actually the downhill was more challenging than the uphill. We’ve been running hills on the treadmill so I was prepared for the incline, but we never really practice downhill which uses a lot of different muscles. 

This is a really nice course – and it was perfect weather – sunny and in the 40s.  There were over a thousand runners this year and it is strong field.  I finished 18th in my age-group with a time of 1 hour 52 minutes. 

Looking forward to trying it again next year. 

Next race:  Lifetime Tri – Tempe Arizona – April 12, 2015