Dallas Half Marathon Recap (or…That Time I High Fived Meb)

This past weekend was the Dallas Marathon, Half, & Relay. This was a big one. A sold out event. Live TV coverage. Huge city. Running royalty like Meb, Deena Kastor, Ryan & Sara Hall.

I ran the half. I was hoping to PR, and maybe break 1:40, but it wasn’t in the cards. I still had a decent race and a great time!

Big state, little medal…It’s all good in da hood.

It all started the day before at the Expo. I had carpooled down with three female friends…Mistake!!! They treated it like a shopping outing, hahahaha! We were there for hours. At least it gave me plenty of time for red carpet photos.

White sunglasses.

Red sunglasses.

After that, it was time to rest up for the race! But like most pre-race nights, I didn’t get much sleep (kept thinking I’d miss the 4 am alarm). But luckily I made it up early to carpool down with another friend. I was glad we were there early to avoid the stress of running late. We chilled for a while before heading to the corrals.

On the way I bumped into Meb! The Meb! But I let him alone so he could focus on his race. I’d see him again later…

I also ran into a bunch of non-Olympians…

Some runner friends before the race.

When I got to corral A, I ran into a bunch of members of the WRRC who I trained with most of the summer/fall.

I thought we were supposed to wear our grey t-shirts that day.

Then it was time to race! After some fireworks and confetti, we were off!

The elites waiting at the starting line.

There was about a 15 mph wind, and it was in the 60’s and like 90% humidity. There was mist in the air and the streets were wet with slickness. The first 9 miles were generally a long steady incline.

Da course & elevation

Conditions weren’t great for a PR, but I gave it a go anyway:

5k ~ 25:08 ~ 8:06 per mile

10k ~ 49:15 ~ 7:46 per mile

Halfway and so far so good. But then the humidity and hills took its toll. I started to slow.

15k ~ 1:14:12 ~ 8:04 per mile.

Finish ~ 1:45:01 ~ 8:01 per mile.

Final Results ~ 501/8441 Overall & 75/510 Division

I was hoping to break the PR I set in October, but wasn’t happening. I was still happy because this was my 2nd fastest half to date!

On da course.

I haven’t always viewed this race in the best light. But I gotta say, the changes they made this year were great! Except for a few bail bond and pawn shops, the course was pretty scenic. I like how we went through many Dallas landmark neighborhoods.

And the energy was terrific! In particular the crowd support was AWESOME! And it was great to see so many friendly faces along the way, like my pal Tory who went all out with his cheer station…

Tory, the sign master.

There was definitely a lot of creativity by the spectators.

After the race with my pal David, and his malfunctioning umbrella.

It was also cool during and after the race, where I can’t even count how many racing friends I ran into…

My friend Sylvia..I’m pretty sure that was her first half!!!

Another cool thing was my local elite friends had a good showing too. Our friend Brent got 7th place overall in the marathon! And my buddy Logan came in first place overall in the half, with a time of 1:08:20!!!

Logan at the finish!

After the race, it was time to celebrate!

Group shot 1.

We had a rotating group of some really strong runners join us for some craft brews.

Group shot 2.

But I gotta say, the COOLEST thing that happened that day was Meb giving me a high five! He was running the first leg of the relay. After he passed the baton, he hung around to support the runners. When I saw him, I made a detour to hit that opportunity (literally)! So cool! And what’s even cooler, later on I got to meet him formally!!!!

Me & Meb. Like peas and carrots…or maybe tortoise and hare.

All in all it was quite a whirlwind. I’m still processing it all. I was really surprised with how much I enjoyed this race. I may have to sign up for next year already!!!

How bout you? Did anyone else race Dallas? Hang out with any Boston Marathon champs recently? Seen any creative race supporters lately?

-Scott

Lots of Running, Ghost Chairs & Taco Hauntings

We finally got a few days of somewhat fall-like weather. Yippee! It made for some good runs. It’s amazing how much of a difference it makes when it’s not a billion degrees.

For Saturday’s long run, it was in the upper 40’s when I meet WRRC at 6am at a strip mall with an interesting store…

Nothing butt good deals here.

A lot of the folks I ran with are gearing up for the Dallas Marathon. I am not. They were going 20 miles. I did not. I ended up with a group that went 15. Why? Just for fun.

It was an out and back because one of the runners wanted to end with hills. And this route started with hills. So that’s a nice hilly bookend. Lucky us. Amazingly though, some of these runners pushed me to negative split. At the half we were an 8:25 pace, but by the finish our total average mile was 8:15! Feels good to be a gansta.

Afterwards some of us mowed down some totally epic tacos. Sadly, I didn’t take a pic, but I did when I previously visited this taco joint.

This place is cleverly called “Taco Joint”

For Sunday Runday, I met my run-bud Serene for some trail running and I added another 6 miles.

I photo bombed her selfie. I’m such a rascal.

She had done a 30k trail race the day before. And.Was.Hurting. But she toughed it out. I’m glad she did, because in the middle of the park we spotted a photo op!

This will be the cover photo when my next album drops.

Lots of people have photo shoots in this park, and I assume that’s what this chair was there for. But nobody was with it. It was just randomly in the middle of a field. Later on it was gone. So either someone took it, or it was a ghost chair. Probably the latter.

Afterwards I went to yoga. The instructor decided it was going to be a power leg day. Lucky us. I legs were shaking so bad, and now I am berry sore. I didn’t take a pic in class…but also this weekend, our friend at Candies and Crunches challenged me on Instagram with a yoga pic. I sent one back.

Leaning tower of paradise. Yes, I’m a mouth breather.

Also this weekend, our friend at My Walk to Rio 2016 challenged me on Instagram with a taco pic. So after yoga I went to yet another taco joint. Again, I forgot to take a pic, but here’s an earlier pic from the same joint.

It’s a BBQ joint in a gas station, and it’s good. They serve breakfast tacos too!

So not a bad weekend of running, yogaing and tacoing!!!

How bout you? Do your run friends push you? Any Instagram friends challenge you? Do you believe in ghost chairs?

-Scott

My Watch is a Jerk (& Dopey Training)

So the previous couple weeks I wasn’t able to follow my Disney Dopey Challenge (5k, 10k, 13.1, 26.2 in 4 days) training schedule due to some sudden weird ache in my knee.  But since I’ve got it rested and taped up, it’s been much better.  I was able to jump back into it the past few days, and that makes me happy.

Dat my RockTape job.

This may change, as the weather here is supposed to go from righteous to growdy.  Today it was 80 degrees (American) and sunny.  Tomorrow it’s supposed to be in the 30’s and sleet/snowing.  What?   And then it gets worse.  Supposed to get colder and colder and icier and icier.  That could mess with my weekend training.

Click to enlarge.

As you can hopefully see, I’m supposed to do 4, 9, 19 on Fri, Sat, Sun.  This weekend is also the Dallas Marathon, and they came out today and said that if the roads are too icy, they will cancel it.  That’s a bummer.  Especially for all those people traveling here and all those who have done months of training.  Here’s hoping the weather dude on TV is as accurate as he normally is (not very at all).

Anyway, since I’ve been able to run again this week, I was trying to be smart and take it easy.  Take it a little slow.  Well, when I got home from one of my runs and plugged the Nike+ GPS TomTom watch into the computer to record my run, it gave me the following message…

Insult me then try to get me to buy stuff, is that your game?

Yes, my training device is mocking me.  It’s insulting me.  It’s taunting me.  Why?  I can only conclude that it is a big stupid head jerk.  I already know I’m running slower than normal…that’s by design you butt-clown!

Ahh well, I’ll get him/her back (somehow) soon enough!!!

How bout you?  Ever been insulted by a robot?  Do you think we’ll be able to run this weekend?  How you doin?

Thanksgiving Running, Gear Deals, & Butt Sweat Hearts

Over the weekend I got to run again!  I had taken 8 days off to let my knee heal more, and on Turkey Day I gave it another go.  I ended up going an easy 4 miles.  Progress!  If you missed what happened the rest of that day, you can see it here.

Anyway, it was stiff and not quite right, but much better than it had been last time.  So come Saturday, I decided to give it another go.  My RockTape came in the mail (which was exciting for me) so I taped up the leg, and met with my peeps at Project Run 214.

Some of the group!

Many of them are preparing for the Dallas Half and Full Marathon this coming weekend.  This was their last big training run.  I was supposed to go 12 miles, but told myself I’d take it easy breezy lemon squeezy.  I’d be very happy if I even made it to double digits.

Well, a funny thing happened.  I ended up running in the front with a gal who will be doing her first half come Sunday.  I hadn’t seen the training course, and of course, we got off track.  I didn’t want to cut out early and leave her, so we just kept going.  Ended up finishing over 13 miles on our make-shift route.  I was thrilled for her going that far for the first time, and happy that my knee held up!

The real test came the rest of the day, I didn’t want the knee to hurt me like it had after my earlier runs.  I’m glad to say that it didn’t the rest of the day!  I think the Arnica, rest, cross training, and other stuff I’m doing is helping!

My kind of PED’s.

When I woke the next day, it did hurt some, but not as bad as before.  I went to yoga, and that seemed to really help it.  It’s still not right, but it’s getting better.  Hopefully I can continue to run while it heals completely.

Anyway, it was also a big shopping weekend here in the States as companies roll out specials.  I was in luck because a new store in the RunOn chain opened near my house.  Besides the weekend specials, they also had grand opening deals.  Besides that they also gave gift cards if you brought in old pairs of shoes to recycle.  Besides that I had earned some cash in their rewards program.  All combined, I was able to score a pair of my Brooks Pure Flow 2 for a really really really good price (and they threw in a pair of Feetures socks, double score)!  Aaaand, they had free beer and snacks.  Triple score!

My butt sweat where I sat shows that I heart Brooks shoes.

Also this weekend, since Thanksgiving is now over, we set up the fake Christmas tree.

All our ornaments on the bottom half of the tree.

Another highlight came when the boy and I had our own brunch date at one of our fav Tex Mex joints.  Like me, he also likes to ham it up for the camera…

I wonder where he gets it from?

So pretty good times.

How bout you?  Get any good gear deals?  Is your crib decorated for the holidays?  How was you weekend?