Well, that was...okay (Half of Quincy RR)

Half of Quincy is in the books.  And although I did PR, and hit exactly halfway between my B and C goals, it doesn't feel very good.

Let's start with the day before.  I was feeling good that day, very excited to be running.  I had a lovely lunch of a leftover half meatball sub and was feeling good.  At night I had a lighter meal - english muffins, one with PB, one with butter, green beans, and a yogurt.  Then I had a serving of chocolate.  Then another.  Only two servings, but that second serving was out of mental desire not true hunger.  It happens, but this time it happened when I was already feeling a bit overfull. 

So - off to bed feeling vaguely queasy.  Slept well, which is good, but it also helped that I had slept well the night before.  Woke up - still feeling a little off from the sugar overdose.  Got up, toasted my bagel, PB'd it, and was out the door on time.  I will pause here to say that on the days that I don't want to do my long runs it's really the bagel that gets me out the door.  Not so much the fueling (which it does), but the mental thing - "ate the bagel - let's go run!".

Drove down to Quincy to a gorgeous, sunny morning.  It was in the forties but I knew it was going to warm up so I was in a long sleeve tech shirt and shorts.  The shirt was from the Tufts Women's 10K from last year, and it was really funny how many other women I saw wearing the same shirt! 

Lined up for the bathroom (of course), and as I was waiting a woman wearing a jacket that said Security came over to the line and tapped the woman in front of me, me(!), and the two women behind me.  She said "Come with me.".   I was mentally like - "What did I do?".  She walked us over to the other side of the hall (we were in a high school), and unlocked another bathroom!  She said since it was only four stalls she wanted to manage the number of people going in....

Did some more stretches, lined up for the bathroom again, got in just in time, and lined up outside.  It was interesting because this was the first year that this half also was doing a 5K.  They both started at the same time and lined up at the same place, but the 5K people were splitting off to the left while we went straight.  I do wonder how well it went in terms of traffic management. I didn't see any issues, but I might do a check to find out what people's experiences were.

Started out feeling...ehn.  Not fast like the 10 mile race, more like just running was an effort.  I fought from the start and it didn't get any better.

And as a note - never believe a race director when they say the course is "mostly flat".  Mostly flat.  Like I'm mostly Nicole Kidman.

The run itself was mostly uneventful.  I did have a mini cheering section in my cousin and her boyfriend.  They were at mile 4.  What's awesome is that I had started out wearing gloves because of the chill, but by mile 4 I was so hot that even though I had taken them off and tucked them into the front of my shorts I even felt hot with them being there.  Just as I was thinking that I saw my cousin ahead of me; she was cheering, I veered over towards her, and tossed my gloves.  She caught them.  Good thing - wouldn't want to lost 67 cent gloves that I had multiple pairs of at home!

As alluded to above there were definitely some hills on this course.  I mentally wasn't feeling them and had to fight to not walk.

I've gotten this far into the race report and haven't mentioned the major problem yet.  My right hamstring/piriformis?   Killing me the entire race.  Literally the entire race.  Luckily it's not the kind of pain that throws off my stride, but it was not fun. 

So even with the oversugaring, painful glutes, overheating (yes - even though it was a light tech shirt I was still hot), I still feel that I gave all that I had that day. 

 My old PR for the half was 2:29:45; this new one is 2:12:00.  So - good.  But just not mentally good.