Well, at this race, I fought a good fight. This was my slowest half marathon ever but, spoiler alert (those never work, do they?), still good enough to come in 2nd Place for my age group (that is to say, the Almost Oldest Men).
I’ve done the Sleepy Hollow HM around 4 times before — I’ll have to check the t-shirts. 15-minute drive to a beautiful, part pavement/part groomed trail course along the paths of the Rockefeller Preserve (the “Rockies”). Weather was sunny and gorgeous. From the very beginning it felt like a good day: chatting with a runner around 40 with a shirt that said “Sometimes Win, Mostly Lose”, I asked what winning and losing mean; finally meeting and getting a hug from Roberta Ruppel, who had been a friend of my mother and was wife of Todd the race director; meeting other triathletes who commented on my SOS Triathlon shirt (“I did that race in 1985!”); watching Guy with White Hair and White Shirt (ultimately introduced as Brian Murphy) jump to the front of the pack and know that he’s winning my age group, so settle in and do what I can.
Tried to stick with the plan: take it easy the first 5 miles, ratchet it up miles 5 to 11, go strong miles 11-13. But this course is really hilly: Big Guy with Shaved Head and Tatoos blurs past on the trail climb from the Hudson River only to walk after cresting (later told me he had cramped up); Route 117 is 1.5 miles of treeless, sunny uphill where I chatted with a young man walking to recover from heartburn, and then some downhill on the way back; the climbs up from Phillipse Manor train station and then up from the lighthouse park and then the last steep, steep hill to the finish line — brutal.
Around 1,250 feet of elevation over the 13.1 miles.
The temp went up from 53 to 67 degrees during the race, and I didn’t bring salt tablets. So between the lack of electolytes, the week of no running to recover from dental surgery, and not enough hill workouts to prep for the pounding, my calves started cramping – alternate legs! – at Mile 8 1/2. Every few minutes, I’m shouting (more like a “yip!”) from the pain. So my goal shifted from “let’s do a negative split” to “drop the pace so I don’t have to walk”.
Look, under those conditions, I’m not complaining about 1:55:57 (= 8:51 min./mile), even though it was 30” slower per mile than my 25k race with similar terrain a few weeks ago; and I never complain about getting on the podium, 2/15 AG, 174/603 OA.
But I’m finally at a point where I’m not defining my race results by my time, or my standing. Rather, success is feeling strong during a race and enjoying most of it until unleashing the power to get faster at the end. That wasn’t this race. A good effort, I fought a good fight, the weather was lovely, and the next one will be better.
