Go! St Louis Half Marathon

Sunday was the Go! St Louis Half Marathon.  Jeff and I stayed in downtown St Louis a few blocks from where the the start/finish was located.  This was well worth it because we walked to our hotel after the hockey game the night before and went right to sleep.  We were then able to sleep in and leave our hotel 10 minutes before the start of the half marathon. 

The weather was a bit warm and humid for my liking (upper 60’s at the start, high humidity), so I had low expectations on how I would perform.  Plus I just wasn’t feeling top notch all week.  To top it off, there was wind and the wind seemed to gust only when we were going up a hill and only into my face.  Oh and I forgot about how the hills are LONG and gradual on this course and there are more up hills than down hills.  Ugh, I hated this course. 

Jeff and I never set out to run together and this race was no exception.  I like to start out at the pace I want to run the whole race (plus I always start way too fast), while Jeff likes to start out slower and gradually get faster.  His method worked, mine didn’t. 

My pace was all over the place.  Usually I am pretty good at keeping a relatively consistent pace and the past few races I had negative splits, but this race was horrible.  I could not settle into a comfortable pace and never felt very good.  I wasn’t struggling, I just could not push myself to go fast. 

At mile 4, I saw a professor from college who was running the marathon. I ran a few miles with him catching up on geological engineering stuff.  I’m glad I saw him because I want to apply to grad school and might use him as a reference; nothing like networking during a race.  Talking to him helped keep my mind off not feeling the best, but it also used up some energy.

At mile 7 I hear “Hey, how are you feeling?” I look and see Jeff!  He looked so strong and was feeling good.  I let him fly past me and I did not want to hold him back, so I just ran my own race and watched him get farther and farther away, all the while getting more and more disappointed with myself…. but I was SOOO proud of Jeff!  He was well on pace to get a PR!  Jeff’s dad was also following us on his bike and it was fun to keep a lookout for him; we saw him 4 times.

The last mile I could see the finish and just said “What rhymes with Bucket?” and sped up to to pass 3 women who were ahead of me to finish in 1:36:15.  Not a PR or what I was hoping for, but not bad either. It was just not my day, oh well, there is always next time!

I crossed the finish and saw Jeff with a HUGE grin on his face, HE GOT A PR, 1:34:00!  AND he felt great the entire race! 

I am soooo proud of him and can see lots of PR’s coming up for him this year.  And as he gets faster, it will only push me more and help me get faster.  I am so excited to continue training with him and to push each other.  We have some big goals in mind for 2012 and 2013…… 

Overall the Go! St Louis Half Marathon is a well organized event.  It is a pretty hilly course, especially the second half of the marathon.  It goes through the Anheuser-Busch Brewery (you get some hoppy smells, some people hate this, I enjoy it) but other than that, it is a pretty boring course. If you live in St Louis it is a great race to run, but I don’t know if I would pick it to travel to.