Rock n Roll Pasadena Half Marathon 2012

Friday
I took a personal day off from work to attend the expo. I had planned to eat ramen before driving out to Pasadena, but the traffic was horrible. So I skipped lunch and headed straight for the Pasadena convention center. Even as I arrived in Pasadena, I had to use side streets to get away from the crowds. I didn't remember this place being that busy in the day time, but I guess people were going out to lunch on a Friday afternoon with beautiful Southern California weather. I parked at the Paseo which gives you free 90 min parking with validation.

I got to the expo about 15 minutes before it opened. I met up with my friend, Marathon Mitch. The expo opened promptly at 1pm. We both went through the somewhat lackluster expo in a matter of minutes. There was hardly anything worth looking at, pretty unusual for a Competitor Group Rock n' Rock event.

Expo time!

I visited my friends at the RunRacing booth. They were carboloading for the expo and checking out the stuff that was in my goodie bag. There was a GU Roctane! But that was about it. They weren't impressed with the race shirt. I concurred. It was okay, but definitely not better than Long Beach's shirts.

The shirt is not better than Long Beach's

I visited the Dodge booth to fill out another questionnaire and won yet another draw-string bag. I refused the bag, but they gave me the red flashing light thing. I picked up some Sport Beans. I bought a pair of mid-weight Injinji socks because I really liked them when I tried them out at the Carlsbad Marathon. Since there was nothing else to see, I went back to the Paseo. I needed to replace one of my old dress shirts, so I bought one in Macy's, validated my parking ticket, and headed home.

Haul from the expo

Dude I was starving during my drive home. The traffic was so horrible that I couldn't make it back in time for any of the ramen shops. They all close at 2:30pm. So the backup plan was to eat at In-n-Out. I hardly eat here because the delicious food always gives me a massive food coma. I got my usual meal, 2 double doubles, fries, and a drink.

"carbo-loading" at In-n-Out

after

Sunday
Weird, my car had a little trouble starting up. Please don't tell me that it's breaking down already! Once it started, it was fine. I got to Pasadena at about 5:30am and parked at Parsons for $5. The address was on Walnut, but the entrance they want you to use was on Fair Oaks. They should probably let us know that in the instructions next time. At about 6am, I gathered my stuff and walked over to the Rose Bowl. It was a fairly long walk, about 1.5 miles. But I figured it would be good post-race walk which was why I didn't opt for the $10 pre-paid parking at the Rose Bowl. Along the way I talked to a girl who was from Phoenix, Arizona. She had just recently started getting into running half-marathons and was going to try and run a sub 2. I gave her a few tips.

The Rose Bowl

At around 7am, I checked my gear bag and went for a little jog to warm up. The right leg is at about 80%. It was good enough that I actually could do a warm up jog. I still had noticeable discomfort when I pushed off on the right leg. But it was much better. If the jog produced too much discomfort, I was going to abort starting in corral 1. But since it felt okay, I decided to give it a go in corral 1.

Starting line

Goal A: sub 2
Goal B: finish better than 3:21:08 to earn a free Brooks cap

The race
I started with a few of my friends at the back of corral 1. I ran the first mile at somewhat of a hard effort. The first mile marker was in the wrong spot, but I'm guessing the first mile was a low 8 min mile. There was a time when this pace felt much easier. I backed off a bit when we ran up California and Orange Grove. This felt like another fartlek run because I had to slow down whenever I started feeling like I was overheating. Going into this race, I figured my right ankle had enough to sustain about 6 good miles. When I first saw the course, I thought the out and backs off of Green would be a pain in the butt, but they ended up being pretty cool since I got to see all of my friends. After taking a walk break around mile 7, I just could not get the legs going again. My hip was starting to bother me at mile 11. But I took walk breaks to try and lessen the discomfort. It was a good thing that the race ended with a loop around the Rose Bowl. Having ran the loop many times, it was nice to have familiar surroundings when I was struggling with the right leg. There was a short climb around the end of mile 13. After that it was enjoyable to be able to run somewhat fast again for the finish line.
1-2: 16:55 (8:28)
3: 9:13
4: 9:35
5-6: 17:42 (8:51)
7: 9:53
8: 9:43
9: 10:53
10:10:05
11: 11:16
12: 10:58
13: 10:26
13.1: 0:51
Finish: 2:07:31

Post-race
I picked up a water bottle and a Gatorade bottle from the volunteers. I then spotted my friends in the photo line. We picked up some Snickers marathon bars. They went back to their car and I went over to the UPS trucks to pick up my gear bag. I changed out of my singlet and headed over to the beer tent. Just as I got my free beer, the post-race concert was just beginning. I made my way pretty close to the front and spotted one of my friends. There was a bunch of beach balls being tossed around. I only spotted her because I hit her with one of the beach balls. Later we were joined by our maniac friends. It was a good concert. It took me back to the 90s. :)

Extra long line for the diet beer

Sugar Ray!

After Sugar Ray had performed most of their hits, I said goodbye to my friends and made the trek over to my car. It seemed much longer going back and everyone around me was walking very slow. I just wanted to get back to my car so I can go eat! I finally made it to the ramen shop that I wanted to try out, Ramen Yukinoya in the City of Industry. It was not bad at all! I think I've finally found a ramen shop near where I live that's decent. This place is cash only. Everyone in the restaurant was glued to the TV because Jeremy Lin was helping the Knicks beat the Mavericks late in the 4th quarter. Asians never really cared about basketball until he showed up. Asians are usually more into golf and tennis. :)

Ramen Yukinoya's tonkotsu ramen and pork rice

Well, I guess it's always good to do a self-evaluation every once in a while. I knew it was too soon for a sub 2, but I gave it a shot and got some feedback on how much the ankle has healed. Once I'm able to start training again, I'll be sure to take it easy and not to rush back into it.

I picked up my current injury a week before the San Jose Half Marathon during a training run with Train 4 Autism. I had just run 2 half marathons under 2 hrs and thought it was a good idea to start ramping up the training. I knew that I should've skipped the run, but hindsight is always 20/20. Since getting hurt I always try not to DNS any of my races as long as I can meet the course time limit at each race. I knew that healing would take a bit longer if I continued to run marathons and half marathons. But I was willing to take that risk just to earn the Rock Idol medal. It's just something that I want to get out of the way.

I've played tennis and gone skiing despite injuries, so I'm somewhat accustomed to playing sports with an injury. I didn't think much differently with running. But having ran more races with an injury than I care to admit, if you're careful with the pain management, injuries eventually heal. I did not take a single pain pill for any of my races. I have to be able to tell if I need to back off during a race. Slowly but surely, things started to get better and the times began to drop down even though I had not been running at all between races. I've stuck to weight lifting, core exercises, and the occasional bike ride.

10/02/11 - 3:09:47 San Jose
10/30/11 - 3:21:08 Los Angeles
12/04/11 - 2:29:00 Las Vegas
12/26/11 - 2:27:40 Operation Jack
01/07/12 - 2:21:30 Disney World
01/21/12 - 2:24:51 Temecula Valley
01/29/12 - 2:08:41 Tinker Bell
02/19/12 - 2:07:31 Pasadena

No one needs to take things as far as I have. We all have our own adventures to go on. My current adventure may have been a long struggle for me, but I've enjoyed every bit of it. Sure I may have cursed myself immediately after each race, but after a day or two, I'm already formulating a strategy to tackle the next challenge. With that said, the challenge that I'm most looking forward to is training for a BQ. First I need to close out the maniacal chapter in my running life which is scheduled to end in June with the Seattle RnR Marathon. Then the races will really be few and far in between until I get it down to hopefully 4 marathons a year. I'll still be using half marathons and other races of various shorter distances as training runs.

Next stop: Little Rock

Surf City Marathon 2012

Friday - expo
Another week, another race expo to attend. I got to the expo at about 2:30pm on Friday, 30 minutes before it opened. There was already a long line formed. When the expo opened, they controlled the inflow of people so that the volunteers handing out race packets did not get overwhelmed. Good organization, but they should probably use a bigger tent. It got pretty crowded inside. But I'm sure it's fine during the off-peak hours.

Entrance

long line for the expo at 2:30pam on Friday

Bib pick up

After picking up my race packet I then picked up a cotton long sleeve "legacy runner" shirt and a teal with black sleeves race shirt. I then went through the expo saying hi to a bunch of my friends. I thought about signing up for the Long Beach Marathon, but I resisted. I visited Andrea at the Renegade Racing booth. I've met so many cool people through running. The only thing I wanted to buy were some mid-weight Injinji socks, but the booth was out of them. I bumped into my friend, James, who has been out of running for a while due to injury. We left the expo and I gave him a ride back to his parent's house that was a few blocks away.

Friends at RunRacing

Andrea at Renegade Racing

Sunday - race day
I drove out early to make sure I got a parking spot on Beach Blvd. The beach parking lot north of Beach Blvd is hit-or-miss when it comes to the parking fee. The instructions always states that you pay upon exit, but there are years where no money was collected. I didn't want to bother with that, plus exiting could be a pain in the butt. I parked around 4:15am and took a quick cat nap.

Around 5am, I got my stuff ready and started jogging over to the Hyatt. I kind of felt stupid as I felt the tongue of my right shoe digging into the top of my right foot during the jog. It was causing enough pain that I had to walk. I had other pairs of comfortable shoes and I obviously brought the one that was the least broken in. I went to my favorite spot inside the Hyatt and just relaxed. I adjusted the offending shoe and hoped that it would not hurt me during the race. I need to make sure I properly break in a new pair of shoes before taking them out for a marathon!

As it got closer to 5:45am, I jogged over the Hyatt bridge to meet up with my fellow Marathon Maniacs for a pre-race photo. We took what felt like about a hundred photos. :)

Marathon Maniacs

Howard and I jogged over to the corrals, but it was still a bit early so we headed into the expo tent. Then right before the 6:30am start, we headed out to our corrals looking for our friends that were pace leaders.

"Why should I practice running slow? I already know how to run slow. I want to learn to run fast." - Emil Zatopek

People always ask me why I don't try to run the entire race at an even pace. The answer is always the same, I don't have the endurance or the patience to jog that slow for an entire marathon. I'd rather work on running faster for at least the first parts of the race. You won't run faster until you spend time running faster. In time, I will take a break and put in the proper training so that I'll have the endurance to run fast with even paces from start to finish.

Goal: 5:10
1st half: 2:10
2nd half: 3:00

Race
I was supposed to start in wave 2, but somehow our group went out with wave 1. I have not run a 8:30 min mile in quite some time. So for the first mile, I wanted to see how it felt. There was discomfort in the right ankle and calf, but tolerable. Since I had 25.2 miles left, I decided to just back off each mile until I got into the 10 min mile range. So for the next couple of miles, I slowed about 30 secs. But I had to speed up a bit to get through the narrowness of the park. I bumped into my friend and was fortunate to run with her until we got out of the park. I then backed off on the pace. Wasn't really much I could I do. With zero training, my endurance is still incredibly lacking.

gun-to-the-head moment shortly after reaching mile 10

When I got to mile 10, I had to switch to the "2 min walk, 5 min run, 2 min walk, run until I get to the next mile marker" strategy. A lot of my friends passed me along the way. I got to the halfway mark at around 2:13. One of my friends spotted me. He was running the half marathon and was having a rough day as he was having back problems. He jogged and walked with me until we got to the point after mile 16 where the marathoners split off onto the beach bike path. He kept my pace honest and was surprised at how many people recognized me on the course.

I like this race, but I really dislike the ~9 miles on the beach bike path. It is narrow and not closed off to the public. It got pretty hot during this section. I was having a rough time around mile 20. I really wanted to sit down and had to take extended walk breaks. As I was leaving the beach path and running back on PCH, my hamstring started to cramp. When I reached mile 25, I walked a little bit and it seemed to help with the cramps. Running towards the finish line was a pain in the butt as they have the marathoners running in a narrow lane in the cambered right gutter. At least it's roped off. Also spectators were crowding the already very narrow lane. I almost had to hurdle a small boy that didn't understand my hand gestures to back up. I am definitely not a fan of races where there's a mixture of runners running different distances.
1: 8:34
2: 9:02
3: 9:26
4: 9:48
5: 8:56
6: 9:00
7-8: 18:32 (9:16)
9: 10:41
10: 10:43
11: 12:46
12: 12:25
13: 12:05
14: 12:02
15: 12:36
16: 12:11
17: 12:46
18: 14:37
19: 15:22
20: 16:09
21: 15:20
22: 13:12
23: 14:54
24: 15:43
25: 13:43
26: 14:32
26.2: 1:58
Finish: 5:17:04

Post-race
This current bout with a lower right leg injury is thankfully almost over. I had sunk as low as finishing DFL with a 7 hr marathon at the St Louis RnR Marathon and a very uncomfortable 3:21 at the Los Angeles RnR half marathon. Injuries will eventually heal. I figured as long as I could walk, I would "run" all of the races that I've registered for prior to the injury. Because even if I took complete rest, I would still have to walk to my car, walk to the office, walk to the market, etc. I switched back to Chi-running to lessen the discomfort. Slowly things started to feel better.

10/23/11 - 7:05:10 St Louis
11/05/11 - 6:32:03 Savannah
11/13/11 - 6:30:54 San Antonio
12/11/11 - 6:04:05 Honolulu
01/08/12 - 6:18:18 Walt Disney World
01/15/12 - 5:31:47 Houston
01/22/12 - 5:44:48 Carlsbad
02/05/12 - 5:17:04 Surf City

Lately, I've altered my diet a little. I used to eat 2 plates of mostly meat, potato, and pasta for lunch. After switching one plate out for a salad, I've felt more energetic, content, satisfied, and no longer suffer from a postprandial dip. It has helped with maintaining my weight despite the lack of consistent running.

I bumped into my friend Jenny in the finish area. We then met up at BJ's with my San Diego friends. I had two beers and the barbacoa tacos. I've been trying a lot of IPAs lately, but I still prefer stouts and porters.

BJ's Tatonka Stout

BJ's barbacoa tacos

BJ's PM Porter

Tinker Bell Half Marathon 2012

Friday expo time
Work has been very busy since December. But I managed to leave work early on Friday afternoon to attend the Tinker Bell half marathon expo at the Disneyland Hotel Exhibit Hall. From the very beginning, this race was different. The expo was more girly than usual. I bought a pair of orange fairy wings from the Team Sparkle booth. I asked how they should be worn. The girl was telling me how I should pin the wings to my singlet and tie the loops around my sports bra. Okay, yeah, I'll do that. :) I also picked up my friend's race packet. The difference in the race shirt was that the women had v-necks.

I visited my friends at the RunRacing booth before leaving. They gave me a hard time for the wings. Good thing I didn't buy some ruffles or a sparkly headband. :)

RunRacing booth - Run Long Beach!

Sunday pre-race
Race morning, I got to the Mickey and Friends parking structure at around 3:30am. For some reason parking was free. Very un-Disney-like to be free. I took a nap in the car and waited for my friends to show up. Once they did, I walked over to her car to give her the race packet. Then I went back to my car to get my stuff ready. Besides the orange World Vision singlet, I had with me the orange wings, orange Asics, and orange PowerAde. Gotta be color-coordinated for a women's race! :)

We walked over to the starting area which was the Lilo and Stitch parking lot. The line for my gear check was abnormally long. After we dropped off our gear bags, I put on the fairy wings. No, I didn't pin them to my singlet or tie anything. I just slipped my arms through each loop. It definitely put me out of my comfort zone wearing those wings, but what-the-heck I'm told that that's where the fun happens. We hit the portapotties and then walked over to the corrals.

Red Bull gives you wings! But I didn't drink any! :)

My friend and I stopped at corral C. My other friend went up to corral A to chase her PR. Then we separated because my friend wanted to do a warm-up jog. I had a feeling that the first mile would be a jog whether you want to or not. The announcer was trying to liven up corral A, saying A was for awesome. Corral B was for the best. I forget what they called corral C, but it was definitely C for crowded!

Corral C for crowded

The race
Sure I was uncomfortable waiting for the race to start, but once our corral was released, it was just another race. But it was one big clustersmurf with tons of walkers in front of you. I followed a faster girl on the median and we skipped a huge crowd of walkers. But there was still many many walkers to pass. Perhaps they need to be in corral W, for walkers. I kept thinking to myself that it was pretty ridiculous for them to start all guys in corral C. We came to a grinding halt at the first aid station. Even with my gimpy right leg, I'm still moving at least 3 to 5 mins faster per mile. Oh well, I'm sure they'll address that issue next year. It didn't clear up until we got outside on the streets of Anaheim. But I still had to manage the soreness in my right ankle and calf and make sure I did not push too hard. This race was pretty much one long fartlek. I felt the most comfortable on the uphills, so I tried to surge a bit on the flat and uphill sections. But I definitely had to take it easy on the downhills. I got to see my Team in Training friends right around mile 5. Miles 8 and 9 are usually when I lose concentration no matter how fast or how slow I run. But luckily one of my friends was there to motivate me to keep pushing. But still I had to walk a bit the next mile to help with the soreness. After that it was a short 5k jog to the finish through California Adventures. I found a girl running at about the same effort and pretty much just followed her to the finish line. Too bad she faded a lot on the last .1 mile. Maybe she thought it was over at mile 13.
1: 9:47
2: 10:13
3: 9:46
4: 9:51
5: 8:52
6: 9:15
7: 10:20
8: 9:39
9: 9:34
10: 11:03
11: 9:23
12: 10:05
13: 9:54
13.1: 0:59
Finish: 2:08:41

Post-race
I picked up my Tinker Bell and Coast-to-Coast medals, took a finisher's photo, and headed for the reunion area to meet up with my friends. This race concluded a very very long January. But I took it one race at a time and survived. I even managed to see some improvements.

I was pretty surprised to finish under 2:10. I was expecting around 2:15 at best. I thought maybe the course was a bit short. But my garmin-wearing friends said that it wasn't. :) Almost everyone that I've talked to after the race agreed with me that this course was better than the one for the Disneyland half marathon in September. I don't care much for the run out to the Honda Center parking lot and the little run through Angel Stadium. The wings didn't bother me one bit during the race. It was actually pretty funny to see them in your shadow as you're running.

The course

One of my friends that was dressed as Tinker Bell got interviewed before the race. My other friend dressed in hot neon pink got her picture in the OC Register. Me, I was just one of about 900 lucky "Tinker-fellas" to be chasing girls for about 2 hours. The final registration stats were 11080 women and 920 men, about a 12:1 ratio. Way too much estrogen in one place! ;)

Wings are required for this race, right? :)

My friends and I walked over to the Rainforest Cafe at Downtown Disney to eat some breakfast. I ordered a Bloody Mary and some breakfast sliders. I'm pretty sure the drink was virgin, because I didn't taste any vodka. Oh well, maybe it's just very watered down since they don't want drunk people walking around Disney property. The sliders were actually hard to put down because they were very dry. It needs a beef patty to grease it up a bit!

Rainforest Cafe - Bloody Mary 

Rainforest Cafe - Breakfast Sliders

Carlsbad Marathon 2012

Pre-race
After the Temecula Valley half marathon, I made my way down to Carlsbad for the expo. The rain came down pretty hard during the drive. I didn't bother changing out of my clothes, so I showed up to the expo with muddy shoes, dirty calf sleeves, and the a medal around my neck. Yeah, I'm one of those guys. :)

Carlsbad marathon expo

After the expo, I drove to the nearby Rodeway Inn to check-in and get cleaned up. They let me into my room, but they hadn't finish making the bed. I think they were still laundering the bedspread. I watched some TV and played some Angry Birds to waste some time before heading out for dinner. I drove down a few exits to Kaito Sushi in Encinitas. I've been wanting to try this place out for a while. It is getting harder and harder to find an authentic Japanese sushi restaurant. Fusion sushi restaurants are just not the same. I got most of my favorites, but they were out of amaebi and mirugai. I will try and come back here next year.

Kaito Sushi - geso

Kaito Sushi - aoyagi

Kaito Sushi - toro

Kaito Sushi - maguro yamakake

Kaito Sushi - kanpachi

Kaito Sushi - tako

The race started at 6am and I got to the parking lot at about 4:30am. The starting line is about a stone's throw from where I usually park, so this race is very convenient. I would just nap in the car until about 15 minutes before the race before rolling out of the car and heading to the start. I got out of my car to use the portapotty. They always have plenty of them at this race. I bumped into a few of friends as we waited for the start.

Race
I kept the first mile easy. I wanted to run as many 10 min miles as possible before the eventual slow down. I sped up a little on the second mile to test the ankle a little bit. I didn't want to do anything too stupid, so I pulled back on the pace. I just wanted to finish the race before the 6 hr cutoff. By mile 8, my legs were feeling very heavy. I slowed way down on the uphill at mile 9. I bumped into my friends who were running their 100th marathon together. I pretty much stuck to my 2 minute walk after reaching a mile marker, run 5 minutes or so, walk another 2 minutes, then run the rest to the next marker. I was feeling pretty nauseous at mile 23 and had to spend mile 24 trying to recover. I couldn't even muster a jog. I almost had to sit down. I forced myself to eat a GU and some Shot Bloks. It worked because I felt better during the last two miles.
1: 9:54
2: 9:16
3: 10:05
4: 10:52
5: 10:05
6: 10:54
7: 12:13
8: 12:59
9: 14:57
10: 12:36
11: 12:03
12: 12:57
13: 12:52
14: 13:42
15: 14:22
16: 14:07
17: 14:14
18: 14:30
19: 15:20
20: 14:02
21: 14:19
22: 14:02
23: 16:02
24: 18:01
25: 14:31
26: 13:54
26.2: 1:59
Finish: 5:44:48

Post-race
Carlsbad was my 70th marathon. I thought after finishing my very first one that I would be a one-and-done marathoner. I definitely have been going for quantity over quality, but I'll be making a switch. Now I have to be good and allow my body parts to heal up. The schedule has been trimmed and read my lips... no new races will be added. It has been one crazy ride to the finish line of my 70th as part of the 2nd "Goofy" in the same month. It was definitely rough going at times. I'm just glad I was able to work my way down to sub 6 hrs. I don't like the stress of not knowing if you can make the race cutoff.

I thought this year's medal was one of the worst. The design was a little too plain. I also prefer circular medals. But even though I don't like a particular medal, they all conjure up memories when I look at each and every one of them.

Finisher's shirt, medal, and assorted stuff

Medal

I called up my forum friends to see if they were still eating at Casa de Bandini. They were still there, so I headed on over. The traffic headed for the freeway was horrible. I keep forgetting each year to just take surface streets. It's far, but it's still faster than trying to get on the freeway.

I'm not a fan of Mexican food, but the Stone IPA was great. It was also great to hang out with my friends and hearing about their races.

Goofy part 2 finished and CharliePro

Casa de Bandini - Stone IPA 22oz

Temecula Valley Inaugural Half Marathon 2012

Pre-race
As if one "Goofy" wasn't enough, I somehow found myself with the Temecula Valley half marathon and the Carlsbad marathon on the same weekend. It would've been good to rest the weekend between Goofys, but I had the Houston marathon last weekend.

And so I drove out Saturday morning for Temecula Valley. The drive took about 1.5 hours. There was some rain along the way, but it had not reached Temecula yet. I got to the race site, Monte de Oro Winery, a little before 6am. I was among the first few cars to park. I picked up my race packet and a nice bag. I was also supposed to get a hat, but I don't think the volunteers knew where they were kept. The volunteer helping me out took my name and number. She said they would mail it out to me.

As I waited in my car while taking a nap, the rain started coming down harder and harder. The original start time was 7:30am. At around 7am, I got out with my umbrella to use the portapotty. As I was getting ready my gear before heading to the start area, the announcer tells us that the race start is delayed because there was a lot of cars that still needed to park.

Rainy day

Nice bag

Race
The rain was going down pretty good and would be off and on for the duration of the race. The race finally started at 7:45am with the faster runners taking off in the first wave. They were releasing about 200 people at a time because the first mile was very narrow. The road was not closed off to traffic. I started in the second wave. In the early miles, the legs felt like they were filled with lead. When I got to my first scheduled walk break, I took an extended break. The legs started to feel better, but I kept with walking after reaching each mile marker because I wanted to be okay for the Carlsbad Marathon the next day. Most of the race was on fire roads and I was somewhat worried about the ankle. Luckily it held up pretty well. My nice white calf sleeves got very dirty. I only wear them these days to stay warm. It felt like a trail race. I ran pretty well on the uphill sections and had to take it easy on the downhills. I kind of ran out of gas during the last mile but was able to muster up a good push up to the finish line.
1: 9:36

2-3: 19:00 (9:30)
4: 11:29

5-6: 22:03 (11:01)

7: 10:54

8: 10:50

9: 11:12

10: 11:28

11: 12:09

12: 11:48

13.1: 14:21

Finish: 2:24:52

Post-race
Seeing how I had just completed the Goofy's race and a half Challenge and the Houston marathon in the past two weekends, I wanted to be smart about this race. My goal was to finish around 2:20 and save enough to make the 6 hr cutoff at the Carlsbad Marathon. I was fine with my time since I was very tempted to stay dry and warm in my car. The race was pretty well organized, but I thought the race course needs to be revamped. Not closing off the road was a bad idea. I'm sure they'll get that changed next year. I love the bag they gave out. I'm going to be using it as my race bag.

After eating a bagel and a banana, I stuck around the finish line to wait for my friends. But they were having way too much fun. I saw them from my car on their final mile as I was leaving for the Carlsbad expo. I might consider coming back to this race next year, but I'm not too keen on running back to back races. Completing one Goofy's race and a half Challenge in one year is enough for me. :)

Finish line

Medal