Houston Half

I ran the my first half-marathon this morning in Houston. I had been looking forward to this race for quite a while, as I've never run (much less raced) a half-marathon and I was excited to see what I could do. I also wanted to get some experience with racing this distance prior to my ultimate goal, the Aramco Half-Marathon in January.

Things I learned in my first half-marathon....
1) I need to lose a few pounds. When I woke up Sunday morning I weighed myself. It's been a while since I've weighed myself so I was curious to see how much I weighed. The scale said 171 lbs. This is about 9 pounds more than what I prefer to race at. I felt heavy leading into the race. I haven't been eating very well. I'm going to go back to watching my caloric intake the next month and try to get down to 164 lbs by Thanksgiving.
2) I need to be closer to the start line when the gun goes off. Unfortunately, HHM didn't have the start area separated into pacing sections. I had to guess at where I should start. I didn't want to start near the front and get sucked into too fast of a start. So I found some other runners that looked to be about my capabilities. Moments before the gun went off I asked the guy next to me what pace he was hoping to run. He said, "Hopefully 9 minutes." My immediate thought was, "FUCK!" I split 7:16 for the first mile, which was not bad (a little faster than what I wanted the first mile to be), but I fartleked the whole first mile and I was forced to weave around a lot of people. This first mile was probably about 7 min effort. Next time, I'm going to start significantly closer to the front. I would rather be around runners that are much faster than me and have the path clear, than to weave around a bunch of fat people.
3) I need to be more even with my splits. I was all over the place with my mile splits and I think I could have run 20-30 seconds faster if I had just evened everything out. My splits were: 7:17 - 7:27 - 7:20 - 7:20 - 7:01 - 6:51 - 7:09 - 7:08 - 7:13 - 7:09 - 7:27 - 7:30 - 7:23 - 43 seconds. I was feeling pretty good after the fourth mile and accidentally ran faster than I wanted. I got a little excited and tried to keep it going. I split 6:51 for my 6th mile. I thought this was probably not a good idea and I purposely backed off, however, the damage had been done. I "hit the wall" right around the 10 mile mark and slowed significantly. If I hadn't had been all over the place with my pacing the first 10 miles, I think I could have maintained a better pace the last 3 miles and finished between 1:34:15 and 1:34:30. This was a major mistake for me which was caused by being too far off the start line in the beginning and being forced to weave around people.

4) I need to prep myself, nutritionally, better. I ate 'okay' on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. But I think I could have benefited from more complex carbs. I had a good spaghetti dinner Saturday night, but it was probably too late at that point for my body to turn those carbs into glycogen. I need to eat better on 2, 3, and 4 days prior to the race. I think this will allow me to eat lighter the day before the race and not feel so heavy. I think better glycogen stores will help prevent me from "hitting the wall" next time.
5) I need get some Gu. I had been advised by a few friends to invest in some gu for the half-marathon, but I had never done it before and didn't want to experiment with it on race day. However, I think this will help replensh my glycogen stores and will also help prevent my from "hitting the wall." I'm going to get some on my next trip to The Woodlands and start using it on my long runs and long quality workouts.
6) I need to bump up the length of my long runs. My long runs have been only about 12 miles, and that has only been for the past month. I've been planning on it, and now it's time to bump up my long runs to 16 miles. If I can keep them at 8:00 to 8:20/mile that should be sufficent at helping my maintain a good pace the last 3 miles.

I'm really beginning to realize how important it is to pay attention to the little details when you race over longer distances. In a 5k race, I can be a few pounds over weight or get by with 8-10 mile long runs. I realize how important glycogen stores are now in these long races.

At the present moment, I'm exhausted and my legs ache beyond anything I've ever felt before. I really hope I'm able to run tomorrow morning (and faster than 9 min pace), but we'll see.