Race Report: Fargo Half Marathon

The week of the Fargo Half marathon was rough. I was back to running like normal, but every run felt so much more labored than it should. High heart rates, still hacking up all sorts of stuff, just generally not how you want to feel on race week. I did everything I could during the week to speed up the process--lots of sleep, hydration, eating healthy nutrient foods. Friday's shake out run was around an 11 minute pace but didn't feel nearly as easy as an 11 minute pace should feel. Woof.

Regardless, I was so excited to travel to Fargo with Melissa and Carter. Melissa and I had done so many runs together this spring, and I knew she was ready for a huge PR, and I was excited to hang out with her and Carter post-race to celebrate. Plus a ton of Sioux Falls runners were also going up for the full and half. Wahoo!!

All of race week I was contemplating race plans for Saturday. I thought best case scenario, I could maybe sneak in just under 2 hours if I was magically feeling really really good. For some reason, I didn't think to plan a strategy for if I didn't magically feel really good. Note to self: that might be something to consider if I ever come down with a 10+ day sickness leading up to my goal race day.

Race morning it was pouring rain. I went to bed not 100% sure what I was going to wear. It was cold, rainy, and the final 5-6 miles were going to be into a strong 20-30 mph wind. I finally landed on a tank, tights and gloves. We were so lucky that we got to start in the Fargodome so we were dry while waiting for the race to start.

We did some stretching, I did my glute activation exercises, and before too long it was time to line up. And somehow we were back in the 3:00 half marathon group. We finagled our way up closer and were ready to rock.

The race started, and I thought I'd try to keep the pace around 9:30-9:45. I tried to dodge puddles the best I could. It became pretty apparent, very early in the race that I wasn't going to feel "magically really good." But I was feeling well enough that I knew I would complete 13.1 miles, which was honestly a concern as the week was going on, and a 5 mile felt like a struggle. My heart rate was pretty high for the pace I was running, honestly my effort felt closer to a 9:15 (shockingly this was my goal pace for my ORIGINAL pacing plan, pre-illness, so I guess that's something). I decided pretty quickly that today's run might be more of a long run pace, and that I should be thankful that I felt well enough to run a half marathon.

1. 9:44
2. 9:49
3. 9:56

The miles ticked off pretty fast at a slightly sub 10 pace. Despite feeling cold in mile 1, I started to feel very comfortable temperature-wise shortly after, but I was happy I had on gloves. My hands would've been freezing. I took my first GU around mile 2, as my stomach was pretty cranky race morning, per usual, and I thought I could use an extra boost early. Somewhere around miles 4-5 I started to get a little bit in my head. Just ruminating on how hard I worked this spring to hit a fast half marathon time, and how out of my hands being sick was. I started to throw myself the tiniest of pity parties when I ran up on a woman who was thanking absolutely everyone in sight. "Thanks for volunteering! Thanks for stopping traffic! Thanks for being out here to cheer us on!" And it reminded me of some advice that I, myself, have given; when you're having a bad day, flip it, don't make it about you, but show some gratitude. I didn't have enough energy to be as positive and uplifting as she was, but I hung on to her for a couple of miles, feeding off of her positivity. Thank you lady wherever you are!

4. 9:52
5. 9:51
6. 9:53

Unsurprisingly, once I stopped the negative thought spiral, I started to feel better. I passed my friend with a new pep in my step, and started to seek out faces in the crowd. I didn't have anyone spectating me, so I started to look at signs of those who were out spectating. Seriously: worst weather to spectate in. As terrible as it was to run in, it would've been TERRIBLE standing around waiting to cheer people on. Kudos to those that were doing it! Around this time, there was a loooooong out and back where we could see the runners ahead of us. YAY! I love this part. I was looking for Carter and Melissa. Carter saw me, then I saw another Sioux Falls runner, Joy, as well as so many others. I got nervous that I didn't see Melissa hoping that she was having as great of a day as I thought she would have. Once I was on the "back" portion of the run I was looking for my runner Sarah to cheer her on, but didn't see her. Something about this out and back gave me a second wind and without realizing it, I had picked up the pace ever so slightly. I checked in on my heart rate and saw that it actually hadn't climbed up at all, just hanging out even as can be since the race start. I did a quick assessment and realized that I was feeling good enough to pick up the last 5 miles to hit a faster finish "long run" effort. New game plan: go! I took my second GU around mile 6. I also took 2 salt tabs at 45 minutes. I wasn't going to risk a calve cramp on a cool day like I had suffered through at the Skedaddle half!

7. 9:50
8. 9:46

Unfortunately for me, this new plan was implemented as we started going into the wind, so that was an added challenge, but I was just excited to pick up the pace and see how I felt. I had previously been looking at a finishing time of just slightly sub 2:10 with my 9:50s, so I was excited to have a new math problem to ruminate on for a change. :P Running nerd, check! Weirdly the new sped up pace wasn't affecting my heart rate at all; I had thought it would surely spike it, but that I could handle that for about 45 ish minutes, but I wasn't really putting in extra effort, just focusing on a quicker turnover. I took my 3rd GU at mile 10 and took my last 2 salt tabs (that had started to disintegrate in my pocket) around 90 minutes.

9. 9:34
10. 9:18
11. 9:36

With a couple of miles to go, I really tried to get my time down to a 9 pace but it just wasn't happening on mile 12. I found some good pump up music on my iPod and tried to just focus on my legs turning over faster. The final mile I listened to Eminem on repeat at least 3 times. Maybe I should just listen to that song on repeat for a whole race?? When we approached the Fargodome, I was ready to kick it in and finish as strong as I could. I had forgotten that they make you run around the Fargodome, so seeing it was deceptive. I tried to maintain a strong finishing kick, but I kept running up to groups of people that were shoulder to shoulder through the final fenced in area. Finally with the portion into the fargodome, I was able to pick up the pace a bit and finish strong. This time I didn't run the final 3 strides with my finger on my Garmin like a yahoo, so that's progress I guess.

12. 9:25
13. 8:51
.17 1:27 (8:33 pace)



I finished my 40th half marathon in 2:06:53 for a pace of 9:39.

Melissa scored a 3 1/2+ minute PR!!

I had myself a nice little negative split, which was cool to see.

Fargo sent us a link with our race photos, which my phone struggled to download. Then later that evening the photos were pulled, only to be put up the next day with the images available to download for $4 each. I re-checked my email, and it definitely said, "Download for Free and Share your images on Facebook or Twitter. Save them – and print whenever you wish."

All of my friends got their pics, but I'm out of luck this time. And since I look like a drowned rat in all of them, I wasn't going to pull the trigger on paying for them all this go around. So just imagine me looking like a gazelle out there. :P