Race Report! Hyannis Half was a Breakthrough!

Same intensity, different runner...

{Editor’s note:  The following article is about running.  If all you care about is bicycles, you not may not be interested.  If you are a triathlete or enjoy reading about people who ride bikes doing other things, you will be greatly rewarded.}

So over the holidays, I decided that I needed a short-term race goal to keep me motivated to train and jump-start my larger training plans for the Ironman in November. I drew up a nine week plan that was nothing amazing, but combined the three disciplines, averaged about 9 hours a week, and fit into my “full-time job and 2 side gig jobs” life. I signed up for the Hyannis half and looked up my time from the race a few years ago (2:17 slow!), and decided that I would try to train to run a 2 hour half.  Nothing remarkable, but a jump-start to my longer IM training plan. Then, I started working with Al and Carl and my training plan was supplemented with power crank sessions, core work, coaching philosophies and racing tips; all well designed and thought out  instructions to tweak and improve my performance. I took it all in, started to see some changes in my training runs with faster times on fartlek and interval runs, and then I had the best race I have ever had. Here’s how it went.

The day before the race we had a beautiful but light snow and I went our for an “opening up run.” I felt like crap and started to worry about how the race would go… just a very heavy slugging kind of run. Not much felt opened up.  But I got through it and went  home to pack up and plan out the food I would eat for the day before the race. We drove down to Hyannis with some friends, had lunch and a tasty Allagash white  for lunch at the British Beer works, went to the expo, and then searched around for a room for the night. The room ended up being a little bit of a nightmare as the heater, among other things, was not operational. However, I am only complaining about this to highlight that you can’t worry about things when they don’t go the way you want them to… you just have to go with it and make do.

So, after a night of overwhelming heat to freezing cold air conditioning, and very little sleep in between thanks to the youth hockey team next door, it was race morning and time to go. I had my pre-planned breakfast at 7:30 of banana, protein powder and oat flour (ground up oats). It sounds gross but it really keeps me going and is easy to digest. We got to the race site and I was nervous but really excited and feeling pretty good. I made a few friends in the port-o-potty  line and snuck into a very crowded, sardine like race choral for the start. I had a gel in the start gates to begin my fueling, and when the gun finally sounded, I walked for a minute to get to the start line. It is always is a bit of an anticlimax. The race started out fast, with 10k runners, marathon relay runners, half marathoners, and marathoners alike all in the same pack. I train and run with a Garmin Forerunner 305 and kept looking at my watch and thinking I should slow down. I was at about a 8:15 clip, but it felt good and so I settled in and went with it. I saw a bunch of teammates in the race and everyone was doing great. By mile 5 or so I was still feeling good but worried because I was going too fast, felt a little hot and overdressed, and had lost my two gels somewhere on the course and had no nutrition. In the past, if this happened to me  my head would have turned into a whipping room and I would have been laying lashes on myself for sucking in every general manner imaginable.  But… for some reason… I was totally okay with myself, my potential failure, and things not going right in terms of preparation and details. I just made plans to scoop up Gatorade as I could, and keep going at whatever pace my body allowed. I wasn’t able to get in a whole lot of Gatorade, but enough. I felt some of the edges of a “bonk-ish, need water and fuel” feeling a few times in the 9-11 mile range, but I was starting to be sooo happy, that it really didn’t matter. So if you were in the race, and some weird girl was running by you saying, “I am so happy, this is my best race ever” between her heavy Lamaze breathing, that was me. When I started to realize I was going to be able to pull in a time under 1:50, I was amazed. I really thought my clock was wrong or that  it was a fluke, but I was psyched. Around mile 12 one of my new  port-o-potty buddies ran up on me.  I was still practicing Lamaze breathing and maybe starting to look a little haggard…. he was perky, 60-something, wearing all the best old school, totally loved and worn out/in running club gear, and a beanie that had “NAVY” across the front. This guy was tried and true and had the prettiest blue eyes. Now here is what is awesome about people and running: it strips us down and connects us so quickly,  intimately,  and with such genuine caring for one another’s well-being, success, and personal growth. We root for each other on every level.  This guy put his steely eyes on me and said, “You aren’t gonna let an old guy beat you are you?” He grinned and his eyes danced when I said, “Yes if it is a gnarly, fast old guy like you.” For that last mile he was right on me, keeping his pace four steps beyond mine but not letting me slow or give up and then kicking it in with me for the last 300, making my last mile average  at about a 7:30 pace. There was a group of us,all strangers now friends,  huffing, working, kicking, and searching with salt-stinging, sweat-filled eyes for the finish line (which is up a hill and .17 further than it is supposed to be). It was awesome. I worked hard, I made friends, I was a friend to myself throughout the entire race, and I ran faster than I ever had before. With a 1:49 finish, I ran 10 minutes faster than my previous best, and 30 minutes faster than how I ran the race in 2007. On all fronts, I had progressed, and for the rest of the afternoon and early workweek, those around me had to hear me chirping, “I am so proud of myself, that guy at the end was great…” every time the race replayed through my mind…

It was better than my birthday and Christmas combined.