Second half

My legs are achy and my belly is full of pancakes. That's right, today was San Francisco Marathon day.

I woke up at 5:24—not to my alarm, since I forgot to turn it on (oops)—but the old internal clock served me well. Zipped into the city on deserted streets, then caught the shuttle to the starting line for the second half of the race.

Then I spent 45 minutes standing around in the rain waiting for it to start. Let's not dwell on that part. We'll just say I got some really good stretching in.

Mile 1 passed by like water. Miles 2 and 3 were strangely hard, but after that I found a zone and didn't really notice miles 4 to 7. The course is blessedly flat, with only a few minor upgrades and several significant downgrades about halfway through.

The section through the Haight and the Mission was pretty cool—the slightly illicit feeling that we were running where only cars are supposed to go. Then miles 9 to 11 ticked by like torture, especially when I mistook mile 11 for mile 12, and pushed faster than I should have.

The last 1.2 miles were like doing endless sprints in high school during preseason soccer, having to talk my way (yes, out loud) through each step. "I'll never do this again," I swore.

Then it was over! And the repulsive electrolyte drinks flowed like...um...nectar. Or anything that tastes better than electrolytes.

Here are my official results:

Bib: 20141
Age: 29
Hometown: Oakland CA
Place overall: 919 out of 2050
Women: 400 out of 1227
F 20-29: 150 out of 372
Finish: 2:05:43
Pace: 9:36

So I won't be representing you in the Olympics anytime soon, but I'm proud of improving my time by about 10 minutes over the Nike Women's Marathon half last fall. It's a direct result of the course—no big hills, compared to five brutal ones in the Nike route, including a really evil climb at mile 11.

After a trip to the hot tubs and the sauna this afternoon, plus an excellent dinner and the refreshing G&T that's a critical part of any training program, I feel great. Drained, mind you, but hearty enough that I can almost forget the pain of the final stretch.

Maybe I'll run the first half next year.