Rachel woke up as a Mrs. this morning. Congratulations to her and John!
The bloggers KICKED BUTT this morning at the Houston Half Marathon. Five PRs, four debuts, and all outstanding runs. All the results are in one place on Jon’s blog, of course, so I won’t bother to list them all here. But congratulations to everyone who ran, and I’m a little sad I wasn’t there to cheer you all on.
I did do a race this weekend, but with everything I’ve got going on, I decided to do one closer to home that didn’t involve driving downtown. I ran the League City Rotary 10K yesterday morning. The race itself, unfortunately, gets a thumbs down for many shortcomings. But the weather was absolutely gorgeous and with Debbie as my unintentional rabbit, I had a great run, covering the ~6.1 miles in 1:04:43. That’s 10:37/mile. (The course was not certified and appears to have been slightly short, according to Google pedometer and thoughts from Buzz, Ron, and Vera Balic — though Vera said Rudy Rocha felt it was accurate. Ron spoke briefly to the race director, who said they’d had a certified course, but had to change it at the last minute after difficulties with the city. Who knows.) There were no mile markers, so I only had splits for each out-and-back — 32:41 and 32:02.
The race was put on by the “other” running store in Clear Lake. I’ve never been there — what can I say, I’m loyal to On The Run. Apparently they only sell Mizuno shoes anyway (strange). I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt and say that many of the race’s issues were a result of having to change the course, but the issues were many and I couldn’t help but compare it to what OTR would’ve done with it.
+ Course was short. And boring — out, back, out, back.
+ No mile markers, anywhere. Not a single one.
+ Chip-timed, but the only timing mat was at the finish. No point to having chips if they don’t record your start time, or splits.
+ Bananas, oranges, and donuts. No other post-race food.
+ Awards ceremony wasn’t until noon, at the Food & Wine Festival. Race was at 8 a.m. Debbie finished 3rd in our age group (I was 4th) but left because she didn’t want to wait another 2 hours for her medal!
+ $30 entry fee when I signed up last Tuesday
The race did have ample water stops, a nice t-shirt, and awesome awards for the overall winners. But there were enough negatives that I’ll think twice before doing it again. Still, I had a good run personally, and got in my long run for the weekend. 10K is the farthest I’ve gone so far this fall; I’ll go for 7-8 next weekend as ramp-up for the Half in January starts in earnest.
Man, the one that gets me is the $30 fee. And that not late reg or race day reg, either.
Glad you had a good run, though. We missed you downtown. Hey, June and I are running Memorial to downtown on Sunday if you want to join us. We’re doing 13 but there’s opportunity to cut that short if you choose. Then we can meet for breakfast.
What time, Vic?
Well, I’m departing the tennis center at 6. June, more on your pace, will be departing at 6:30. Estimated time of arrival back at the tennis center, 9:00 for June, some time around mid afternoon for me. 🙂
We need to coordinate with Joonie B cause I think y’all run about the same pace. I do know she’s leaving at 6:30. She’ll pass by me sometime after leaving downtown and will probably return around 9 or 9:15. You want to do the 13 or run part of it? We can coordinate and all meet up for breakfast.