Well, it was really a gorgeous day in Center City Philly yesterday, and the party atmosphere was almost too inviting. I spent maybe a little too much time socializing before the race start and when I turned to find my corral I had some difficulty getting across the fence! "Where do we go to get in?" I asked. "You climb under or over!" and three people picked up the orange plastic fencing and I slipped under just in time. Just in time to walk, of course, for the first minute or so, but at least I was in position. And dang if I didn't miss Mayor Nutter's pearls of wisdom before they let us go.As someone who's run The Loop (around MLK/West River drive, across Falls Bridge & then down Kelly Drive back to the Art Museum) a few times, I was happy that the "extra" part of the race around City Hall was first, not last. Once we were on the approximately 8.4 mile Loop, I felt like, hey, this is just my Sunday Loop run with my Fairmount Running Club buddies.
Well, except there isn't nearly enough shade in the middle of Kelly Drive!! Crossing Falls Bridge somewhere between the 8 and 9 mile mark, I heard the bagpipe band and it really put a smile on my face. I thought, "It's the sound of the sun coming up!" Sure enough coming off the bridge and rounding the corner onto Kelly Drive, we were suddenly facing into the full sun. It was a warm day by then -- not HOT by any stretch of the imagination -- but I am a total baby when it comes to running with the sun pounding down on me! Waah!
My time was five and a half minutes slower than I had hoped for, something to work on in time for the next one in November. I wanted to match the first-time time of my friend, Paul, who told me his first half-marathon (when he was 14!) was 1:45. I finished in 1:50:22.
Paul's son Julian also ran his first half-marathon yesterday, and so Paul drove us both there and arranged for our post-race entertainment. Julian did awesome! He ran with a pace keeper, a friend of Paul's we ran into who happened to be running the race solely to help another friend keep pace. Julian was able to go along for the ride - er, run! When they ducked into the porta-pots along the way, Julian decided to keep going on his own. He ran a great race!
It wasn't the beach, where a lot of my fellow Tri-Dawgs (including Paul!) competed in a triathlon on Saturday, but it was a really fun race and a great day for it! Now I'm off to register for the November half-marathon.
[photo: Russia's Liliya Shobukhova, who won the thing in 1:10:21. Second place went to Beijing marathon Olympic silver medalist Catherine Ndereba of Kenya]
