"Dude! When Has a Half Marathon Ever Been Fun?"

"In life, the race for excellence has no finish line."

A half marathon is always fun if you make fun your priority. Unless you want to have fun by smashing your personal best...in that case you have to go through hell to have fun. I was looking for an overall fun experience, not the suffering type of fun. Spokane Half Marathon; "I am holding myself to the standard of simply having fun, no time goals needed." The trip to Spokane was very enjoyable. The drive both directions was great, the weather...perfect, the accommodations...prime. Again, I was put up like a king by my friends in Spokane...shout out.

Also, I had a chance to stop at Fitness Fanatics and ride the fastest time trial bike in the world, awesome. Race morning was cold, the temperature, according to the vehicle I was in, was 27 F. It was actually perfect because I was going to use this race as a tune up for the Seattle Marathon. If I could comfortably run in short sleeves in 27 degree weather I would do the same in Seattle.

Needless to say it was cold, even with a 2 mile warmup I was still freezing...but delighted to be at the race. I don't remember much of the first part of the race, the most likely reason being I ran with patience and enjoyed it. I remember looking at my watch and seeing 160+ bpm, which is high, but it didn't stress or hurt at all, so I figured what's the worst that could happen.

I remember a lot of hills and crazy group of cheerleaders starting at the 4 mile mark...wild bunch! Still under no stress I hit the 6 mile mark, finding myself and one other runner running by ourselves, no one in sight. Weird! The results say 675 people did the half but for 2.5 miles I was deserted and alone on my section of the course. In both half marathons I ran this summer I ran extremely patient the first half. I really enjoy racing this way as the strength I saved in the first half is always there in the second half and the finish, it feels great. True to style, I was ready to cruise after hitting the halfway point. I ran with a quicker turnover and less concern for the hills.

I had made way up and around a group of runners, feels good. It would have a been a wicked negative split for this race if it were not for mile 9's Doomsday hill, not that it was insanely hard, simply I lost 2 minutes through the trek up this monster, oh well. Honestly the miles never hurt, I caught people, ran with the groups for a minute or two then left them behind. Maybe I need to not run so conservative the first half...nah.

Mile 11 found me in a group of 5 runners. I felt the pace lift, they were surging, I never was worried, I felt too good for them to suddenly crack me...at mile 12 they were left behind and out of sight. The final mile was fun, I was running well, I was finally warm, except my left hand which remained frozen the whole race. Twisting and turning the course entered Riverfront Park.

I was fine to cruise the finish easy, but...a guy 10 yards ahead of me looked back. I don't like that, I would have been fine with not sprinting to catch him, but when he looked back I took it as a personal challenge. By looking back he threw out the challenge that he was concerned and wanted to beat me. "Okay, you brought this on yourself buddy." With 50 meters to go I was on his heels waiting for my chance. With 20 meters to go I poured on the speed cutting across the width of the finishing chute (think tour de france) pulled ahead without a challenge and came flying into the half marathon chute at full speed.

I'm sure it was much grander in my head than in reality...but memories are what you make them to be, for me the grander the better. ~ An hour later I was asleep, hood up, drifting in and out of the post race food and marathon festivities. A fun day, comfortable 95 minute run, negative split, 48th of 650+ people. I definitely would go back to this race.