Thursday, December 8, 2011

Ready to Rock n Roll: My 1st Half Mary

This Sunday I will run the Miami Beach Latin Music Half Marathon (known as the "Rock and Roll" events outside of Miami), my first half-mary, well...sort of.  Forgive me if I sound snobbish here, but since my first real 13.1 was after I had already swam 1.2 miles and biked 56 miles, I feel pretty confident going into Sunday's race.  Whereas Miami 70.3 was a long endurance event, in which I was worried mainly about finishing, this half marathon is about leaving it all out there and putting up the best time I can.  

When I signed up for the race about 4 months ago, I was just beginning to ramp up my running mileage; I had no idea I would be doing a 70.3 event this year and simply running 13.1 miles was beyond comprehension.  The application asked for my anticipated finish time, and I put 2:10, which at that moment I thought was attainable, but ambitious.  Needless to say, I have since seriously upped my training-load, and the speedwork has led to substantial increases in my pace. When I check in tomorrow I'll be updating my projected time so that I can be placed in the proper starting corral.  My new goal is to break 1:50.  As long as the bridges don't wreck my pace too badly I should pull it off. 

I'm pumped to give Sunday everything I've got, and am glad that I'll be running with lots of familiar faces out on the course.  In addition to a handful of Locos, I also will be joined by my cousin who signed up a few weeks ago.  An athlete her whole life, who runs regularly for fitness, she had no plans to run this race.  In a few weeks time she upped her volume and is ready to go.  She makes it sound and look easy, and I'm looking forward to running alongside her for a good bit of the race.  

While Sunday will be a day for going all out, tomorrow on the other hand will be an exercise in self-control.  After race check-in (to pick up my number) my wife and I are hosting a party to celebrate her birthday and our departure from Miami (we have a week and a half remaining in Miami, more to come on that soon) with about 40-50 people.  I'm certainly sad that my time in the MIA is wrapping up, but what better way to spend a Saturday afternoon than with all of our friends and family.  While I'll certainly be joining in the festivities, I'm going to do my best not to get too festive (read: not too much sangria or churrasco).

Cheers.


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