On May 4th I raced the Recharge with Milk Half Marathon (for
the 3rd time in the last 4 years) feeling somewhat confident that it
would be a good race. The key was if the weather would co-operate as we have
seen some pretty inconsistent weather so far… and Sunday was no different.
Prerace preparation included tons of water, pasta the night
before, extra RECOVERYbits before bed, and then 2 bowls of crockpot steelcut
oatmeal and maple syrup for breakfast, and extra ENERGYbits in the morning.
Sun morning it was just above freezing at 5am and the wind
was expecting to be gusting up to 50km/hr from the west… We arrived at the
starting line WAY too early – like 6:15am for a 7:30 start and it was cold…
windy and cold, but we stayed warm and kept each other upbeat as we waited for
the start.
The Smooth Running group consisted of a few veterans of the
race, a few running this race for the first time but not their first half, and
one newbie… and the support we had for each other was incredible!
The prerace events were normal … we managed to huddle around
a store front and kept ourselves as warm as could be before heading to the
chute to start. I took another serving of ENERGYbits and a banana before
heading to the starting line to ensure that I would have enough fuel for the
race.
My running buddy and I decided in advance to try to place
ourselves ahead of the 1:45 pace bunny so as to not have to try to track it
down, but the crowd towards the front was pretty packed so we found a spot in
front of the 1:50 pacer and waited for the start.
We took off at a decent pace – and headed into the wind for
the first 5k – pacing around 5:00/km which would hit the 1:45 goal I had set
for myself. I kept Kerry in sight but let him move ahead and felt great heading
into the U of T Mississauga campus and ran my best at the 6k mark posting a
4:44/km pace.
Heading towards the lake I kept running strong and was
averaging around 4:57/km factoring in the slow wind start and kept going
feeling great. I took only sips of water from my bottle, avoiding the chaos of
water stops and took some more ENERGYbits as fuel at the top of the hill at the
12k mark and felt the best I had ever felt on this course – and looked forward
to a strong finish.
Before I knew it, I was running towards the lake and
approaching the 17k trail when I ran through a cloud of midges (bugs) and
increased my protein intake with a mouthful of them requiring another swig on
the waterbottle…
At this point there was just around 3k left and I knew I had
more in the tank so I started to increase my turnover rate and proceeded to
power through to the finish feeling tired but so excited to cross the line with
my first sub-1:45 time(1:44.01)! It felt great to have set a goal of beating my
PB (1:47.47 at that race) and trying to achieve a specific time and doing it!
To tell you the truth I never even saw the 1:45 pace bunny and felt so in
control that I never even worried about it…
The race went perfectly – it wasn’t too hot or cold, though
the wind picked up after and made it very blustery watching everyone else
finish. The crowds along the route were great – they’re cheering and signs
always uplifting and amusing and having the bands playing is also a welcome
addition.
The Mississauga race is a top notch event – the coordination
is smooth and the event is always enjoyable which makes it a must on my race
calendar.
