April 22 2012 was the Weinstrasse Half Marathon and Full
Marathon.
I got up early and had my usual scrambled eggs with bacon
bits and brown toast with coffee. The start was at 1000 so Michelle and I left
home around 0815 then picked up our friends Carsten who was also running, and
then Sylvia who always comes and supports us. It turns out that Carsten was out
on the beer the night before so wasn’t looking 100% when we met him!
The weather has been terrible for the last few days; rain,
wind, hail etc and the forecast for Sunday said there was a 50% chance of rain
later in the day, but that between the hours of 1000-1300 it should stay clear,
perfect!
I wasn’t sure what time to expect to come in at as the last
time I ran this race I was in good shape and ran it in 2Hrs 20 mins but I was
injured for most of 2011 and haven’t ran a half marathon since May last year,
so I thought If I came in somewhere around the 2hr 20min it would be ok.
Heres a picture of me setting off, waving to the fans!
Got off to a good start; the road at the beginning was a
little tight for all the runners as it starts off in the village of Bockenheim
which is really old so all the streets are narrow. But after a while it thinned
out and I could concentrate on keeping my pace up. This was the first race I ran
with my Garmin 310XT sports watch and I loved it! It shows you what time you
will complete a KM in if you keep to your current pace so I was able to be
consistent most of the way through. I knew it was going to get hilly in the
middle part of the race so I went out quite quick (for me!) at the start but
was also holding some back too. Then when I got to the hilly bit I done that no
problem and carried on, still feeling good!
At KM19 there is a monster hill climb for the best part of a
kilometer and it’s bloody tough. A lot of people were walking up this but I could
see that I was on for a good time if I didn’t slow down, so I kept on pumping
and got to the top without walking. Then looking at my clock I could see that if
a went like a bat out of hell I might get in around 02.12 so I started running
as fast as I could. Luckily the end is either flat or slightly downhill so I managed
to pull off the fasted 2 laps of the whole race and landed in at 2 hours 10 mins!!
VERY HAPPY with that!
I normally have a beer or two to celebrate after a race but I
am off the beer for now so it was an alcohol free hefe weizen and then round to
our friends Garret and Maike for a BBQ which was great. I fell asleep there for
a bit but all in all I was feeling good, with no injuries or issues to note.
All in all, a fanstatic day and looking forward to the Mannheim Half Marathon
on May 12th.That race is much flatter so I will hopefully have a
faster time there… 2 hours maybe?
Notes: 21.1 Km, 2 hours, ten mins
Food - eggs and toast, coffee for BF, energy bar in run, orange power drink mix in camelback which worked great.
Cals burned - 2063.
Garmin Stats: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/170718524