Race Goals

My half marathon in California (Disneyland!) is in 5 days. I'm very excited. It's not my first race, or my first race at this distance, but it's the first where I truly am setting goals. I'm going with the safe/probable/stretch goal trio.

* Safe - beating my first half marathon time. Since that was based on much less running experience plus injury plus a nasty cold, it would probably take asteroids to keep me from beating this. Or really long lines at character picture stops.

* Probable - Time goal of < 2.5 hours. It's a nice goal number and reachable, based on training calculators. It's what I will be aiming for. And it's the first time I will be watching my time before the last mile to figure out what I need to do to make it. Hope my brain is warmed up along with my feet, because there's some math a comin'!

* Stretch - Average of 10:30 per mile. This is a stretch goal but maybe not as stretchy based on recent training runs. I have to be careful with this one - don't want it as primary because I could see myself starting out too fast (common problem) and running out of steam aiming for this. It's more of a "we'll see how it goes, and grow from here" goal.

I'm way excited for this race. Disney does a great race from my first experience, plus I'm running in an area I've never been to before. Double fun! Just based on that, I expect to be happy. If I hit one goal I'll be extra happy. If I hit two, I'll be ecstatic. Three - you'll have to talk me down from the moon.