She got into town late Wednesday night. Then we stayed up until like 4 in the morning....I'm still trying to fix my sleep schedule! Thursday we popped into the expo in between my two classes. We got there around 3 or 3:30, I believe. We had no wait anywhere at all in the expo. We found some new foods we liked, signed up to win free races, and spend way more money than we should have. It was a really fun time, and I actually liked having the time constraint of getting back to class; I think it stopped me from spending even more money! I've heard rumors that others had issues with the expo on Friday. I guess that is one benefit to being local!
Saturday morning we woke up far too early, around 4:30. We hopped in the car and headed to Hutchinson Island (the Convention Center across the river). Going over the Talmadge was terrifying with all of the fog! We couldn't see any other cars until we were super close to them. But we made it safely and made our way onto the ferry. Will stayed with us in/next to the corral until it was almost time to take off. RnR didn't start letting runners off until around 7:15 instead of 7. It wasn't a huge deal, but there was nothing communicated that I heard about why we were running late, so that was slightly unnerving. I read later it was due to the fog, but we still started in heavy fog so that makes no sense to me. Oh well!
I was in corral 18 and she was in 21, which were just assigned based on our estimated finish time. After corral 10, I believe, they didn't have the corrals fenced in and weren't checking numbers, so we started in 18. According to Will we actually went off with what they announced as 19, I guess just due to people feeding in as we walked up. We were right in front of the corral and took off running down Bay St. I did get confused at first. In my sleep deprived brain, I just knew I'd run the event before, but none of what we were running looked familiar. Silly me forgot I did the relay, and only ran the second half - that was much more comfortable and familiar, and in a part of town I actually knew.
Going into this race, Cori and I both knew we were undertrained. Neither of us had been running or working out. After Spartan on Sept. 19, I went to yoga a couple times and weight lifted maybe 3 times, but that was about it. We didn't know what was going to happen in this race. Running wasn't working for her, but I kept on with my intervals as long as I could. Spoiler alert: We later found each other anyway! Here's my breakdown of the race.
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| Before the half |
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| The ferry ready to board |
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| Clearly, our spectator is enthusiastic |
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| Start line selfies! |
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| Just running through zombie fog...nbd |
Mile 0 - 5ish - We were in the ghetto, there's no easy way to say that. There were condemned houses right and left, we went through the train stockyards, over multiple train tracks, etc. Not the best way to showcase Savannah, and not a part of town I'd ever been in before. That said, the locals were out all over the place and every one of them was offering continuous good mornings, good jobs, God blesses, etc. They were pleasant and nice and super supportive! The only exception to this was a small group of people 'protesting' about someone a cop had killed, etc. This was around mile 2 and was not something I found appropriate to the race. I just tried to block it out.
Mile 1: 14:29
Mile 2: 14:02
Mile 3: 16:46 (fixing shoe and water stop)
Mile 4: 15:33
Mile 5 - 7 - No, this is not broken up evenly. I tried to mentally break this race into 5ks to get through it, but this recap is based on how I think of the race. This brought us into the "normal" part of historic downtown and into familiar territory for me. Also just past the 10k mark is the relay transition zone, so then it was the part of the course I'd actually run before too. More spectators were out with signs and enthusiasm, a great band was in the middle of Oglethorpe Ave, and it was a great time. Mile 5 was when I started being affected by the heat, and a lot of pain started kicking in, and I truly slowed down. Somewhere just past mile 5, I took a bathroom break, and it truly helped just to have a moment to reset. That unfortunately only lasted for about a mile, and then I started having bad pain in my bad foot. At the 10k mark, we turned onto Oglethorpe. The course takes you down about half a mile, and then there's the turn around to go back up the other side of the road. They were starting to divert people here and made them turn around before the rest of us. This is where I caught up with Cori. She had thankfully found a buddy to walk with, and I began walking with the two of them. I walked through mile 7 to try to deal with the pain that was now in my bad foot, knee, and both hips.
Mile 5: 16:39 (heat and pain started kicking in)
Mile 6: 18:43
Mile 7: 19:53
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| Loved this group! |
Just past mile 9 was where we were diverted on Henry St. There was also an angel of a lady with a huge cooler full I knew I wasn't far ahead of Cori because I'd barely run since I left her, so I just waited. Since we were going to get in early, I knew Will might not be at the finish line yet, and I couldn't cross that finish line without someone there for me. Plus, I figured it wasn't like I had a good rhythm going anyway, so I might as well have some fun until the finish and spend some time with my sister. They were turning us before these next couple pictures, but she wanted a selfie with them and they didn't insist we turn yet, so we pressed on a couple tenths of a mile. We could have gone up further before being forced to turn, but decided to do so after the big inflatable.
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| Right before we turned around |
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| But first - one more selfie |
Unfortunately, after the turn, we had absolutely no freaking clue where we were. We didn't know how long until the finish, which makes me very nervous. I don't like not knowing where my mileage is, no matter how slow I'm moving, but it was just something I had accepted. It turns out we were about a mile and a half from the finish when we turned around. Cori, Michelle (the walking buddy she had found) and I walked ourselves into the end. We were hot, we were tired, we were dehydrated, and we were in pain. Well, I know Cori and I were, I suppose I shouldn't speak for others. We had merged back in with the full marathoners, and tried to avoid getting in their way. We talked, we laughed, we tried to make the best of the situation.
Finally, we came across the finish line. We ran for all the photographers towards the end, and of course across the finish line. I came in at 11.45 miles in 3:20:24 (moving time 3:10:04).
Mile 8: 16:52
Mile 9: 18:33
Mile 10: 21:45
Mile 11: 19:03
Last .45: 8:00
After - Thankfully, we found Will quickly and got out of the finisher's area as fast as we could. I was in too much pain and couldn't handle people at that point. We got about half a block down and sat on a stranger's front steps (sorry stranger!). I was trying to calm down and let my body process what just happened. We drank chocolate milk and listened to Rascal Flatts from afar. We switched running shoes for flip flops and I put on compression sleeves. We had about a mile walk down Abercorn St to get to the ferry to get back across to Hutchinson. We made a couple stops along the way because of the pain I was in. Oh, and to get Leopold's and beer.
It was a decent race overall. I have a lot of conflicting thoughts. I didn't perform as I could have both due to lack of training and due to the heat. Spoiler alert - even people who live here are not prepared for 80+ temps and 100% humidity in November. When I did this race 2 years ago, it was freezing at the start and I was warm but not scorching hot in long sleeves. I believe last year it started out around 50 degrees. There's absolutely no reason water stops should have been out of water or cups. Many people went to the hospital due to heat related issues, and sadly one person died. Another died later that day after collapsing in a post-race shower. They were tough conditions and I don't mind missing the 1.6 miles I don't have, but I know some do. It was a tough call to make.
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| On the long walk back to the car |
The 1 Mile
I did 2 minutes run:1 minute walk and finished in 12:07. I was proud of myself because I ran the first .2 straight and the last .27! When I was about to start running I was at .73 and told myself I could run the last quarter mile. It was difficult and I was going to stop for a few seconds and catch my breath, but there were soldiers stationed along the last .15-.2 and I couldn't stop in front of them! So I just pushed on.
I've never run the day after a half before, and I think it helped a TON with making my legs feel better!
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| Before the 1 mile |
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| Blurry - but all the medals! |
I'm linking up with Patty, Erika, and Marcia for Tuesdays on the Run. They're talking about Post Race Celebrations this week - go check them out! Our celebrations included lots of food, naps, and milkshakes!
Lauren
