Long Beach Half Marathon Race Report

I ran in the Long Beach Half Marathon yesterday. It was my first half-marathon. I hurt my leg training and decided to walk it, finishing in 3:03:31 (chip time, my gun time was 3:06:15). Now I have a time to beat!

I read about the problems with traffic at this event before (it's a bike tour, plus a marathon, half-marathon, a 5K, and a kids' 1K all rolled into one) and decided that I would avoid the traffic problems (as well as the $10 parking fee) by parking at a Metro line park-and-ride station (Wardlow Station on the Blue Line) and ride down to 1st Street, which was only a few blocks from the starting line.

My sweetheart was able to make it out that day to cheerlead for me and I texted him my splits when I passed each mile marker:

Mile 1 - 7:51 AM
Mile 2 - 8:07 AM (16 minutes)
Mile 3 - 8:21 AM (14 minutes)
Mile 4 - 8:36 AM (15 minutes)
Mile 5 - 8:51 AM (15 minutes)
Mile 6 - 9:06 AM (15 minutes)
Mile 7 - 9:19 AM (13 minutes)
Mile 8 - 9:33 AM (14 minutes)
Mile 9 - 9:47 AM (14 minutes)
Mile 10 - 10:02 AM (15 minutes)
Mile 11 - 10:16 AM (13 minutes)
Mile 12 - 10:29 AM (13 minutes)

My shins were bugging me from the start until about mile 5. I thought for sure I wasn't going to be able to have a good time then. Around mile 10 I was feeling great and felt that I could run the last mile. I did run part of the last mile, but by then my legs were so tired I couldn't run the whole thing. Or maybe I was running too fast. My sweetheart said I did the last part (from Mile 12 to the finish) in around 9 minutes. If that's the case I must have been running really fast, because even when I train I run around 12-minute miles. I know I really pushed it after we turned off of Ocean Ave. at the end. The finish was downhill and pretty easy. :)

I saw some characters on the way. There was one guy around mile 2 or 3 who was running the half marathon barefoot. There was an old man who was running way faster than me around mile 3, but I passed him at mile 12. There was another guy, a Filipino who was on one of the organized teams, who I met around mile 2. I passed him around mile 11 or mile 12 as well. There was one guy at mile 11 who was running slower than I was walking. He told me, "oh, you're doing really good!" I told him back, "No, *you're* doing really good!"

There was a guy (I'm not sure if he was a volunteer or a spectator) at Mile 11 who said that it was all downhill here from here, and that it wasn't the first time a guy lied to you (Mile 11 was the last or second-to-last minor incline). I told him that it wouldn't be the last, and he got a real kick out of that.

The course took us near the starting line just after Mile 6 and my sweetheart was there to cheer me on. He asked me if I was having fun and at that point, I really was! I definitely think his presence at the race helped me out a lot. I knew they had music and "stuff" going on at the finish line but I didn't want him to get bored waiting around for me.

They put our names (or a 'nickname') on our bibs, so people could cheer you on by name. At the water/powerade station at Mile 12 the volunteers saw me texting and shouted out to me. Hey, we live in a modern world. :)

It was a beautiful day too. During the middle miles along the beach it was dead quiet. All you could hear were the waves and the breeze. People were listening to their iPods and not talking. That was kind of weird, to see so many people in a group moving along and not talking.