I got ready and left the house at about 4 am for the drive out to Palm Desert. The drive out took roughly 1.5 hours. One of the main reasons why I like and continue to run this half marathon was that they have race morning packet pick-up at no extra cost. The drive wasn't too bad, but boy, I was pretty tired. After exiting the freeway at Monterey Ave, I pulled into the Starbucks just off of Country Club Dr. On the mobile app, I ordered a grande pistachio latte before going inside to pick it up.
Grande pistachio latte
With the coffee in hand, I continued down Monterey, turning on Fred Waring Dr to head towards Palm Desert Civic Center Park. Since I always get here super early, I opted to park in one of the stalls next to City Hall which was right next to the portapotties and the start line. There was plenty of spaces further down the road.
Per the usual, packet pick-up was scheduled to open at 5:30 am with the race starting at 7 am. After picking up my bib and long sleeve shirt, I headed back to my car. Since the park restroom wasn't opened yet, I used one of the portapotties.
Race shirt distribution
Long sleeve race shirt
At about a quarter after 6, I was treated to a very beautiful sunrise. I always prefer watching a sunrise over a sunset. I slowly started getting ready for the start of the race. Of course, I bumped into the usual suspects as I got into the starting area just behind the start line.
Beautiful sunrise
Ginny
Start line
Karen and Dan
This year's new course map
For this race, I wore the Mesa Marathon race shirt from last weekend. It was one of the nicer feeling polyester "tech" shirts. I had forgotten to clean my hat as it was still caked in salt. In an email leading up to the race, we were notified that the course was modified due to road construction. For the most part, the course was the same. The first change was the elimination of a short little out and back on the road to the College of the Desert. The second change was on Portola Rd as we approached mile 7. Instead of continuing along Portola, we made a left turn onto Gerald Ford Dr. That was followed by a right turn onto Cook St. The mile long climb for mile 9 really wore me out as it was my slowest mile. I couldn't get the legs to turn any quicker once the course switched to being downhill. Finally, as we approached mile 11, we made a right turn onto Hovley Ln to head back west to Portola. While running along Hovley, I saw a disabled muscle car in the middle of the road. There was a police officer there to make sure that the runners were still protected. If I had to guess, I would say that an impaired driver did not handle the road closure too well and crashed the car. With a left turn onto Portola, it was less than 2 miles to go. Shortly after reaching mile 12, we made a right turn onto Magnesia Falls Dr. The third change was the out and back was much shorter. We turned back right before reaching San Pablo Ave. With one final short out and back, we entered the park to head for the finish line at the same spot as always.
Finish: 1:50:46
Click here for my Garmin data.
I was quite content with today's results. I believe that with better pacing, I had maximized my performance. I made sure to not let that first mile dip below 8 minutes. I preferred this course as it broke up that long climb up Portola into two smaller bites. It gave me an outside chance of finishing in under 1:50. Hopefully, my body will eventually allow me to run in the 1:40s on a consistent basis.
Shortly after I got my finisher medal, I bumped into Ron. I had met him last year at this race. He's a 73 year old guy, who beat me by a lot this year! It was so amazing and inspiring to see someone still running fast at his age! I grabbed some post race snacks before heading back to the final stretch to cheer on some of my friends. After my friend got her age group award, they headed for the beer garden. After chatting a bit and getting a group selfie, I started heading back to my car for the drive home. The drive home wasn't too bad. It only took about 10 minutes longer compared to this morning's drive.
Finisher medal
Post race snacks
Robert
Dan
Karen on the podium
Elvis was fast!
Beer garden
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