Skinny Raven Half-Marathon 2013 – Race Recap

This race recap post is long overdue, but it has been a crazy busy week. Moving into our new house was quite the chore (as to be expected), but I literally got everything unpacked and put in its proper place by 10 p.m. Sunday night! Success!!

In between moving and unpacking over the weekend, I managed to run a half-marathon on Sunday. Nothing like cramming as much as possible into a single weekend. Something I am very good at—just as my husband.

This was my 4th time running the Skinny Raven Half-Marathon, which starts on 6th Avenue in downtown Anchorage. The Big Wild Life Runs weekend events feature a marathon, marathon relay, marathon walk, half-marathon, a 5K, and a kids 2K.

It was a rainy, dreary day, but at the same time the rain doesn’t bother me that much. I will take it over snow any day. (I’ve said this multiple times in the past and will most likely continue to say this.)

Best thing about the day: literally no wait for those port-a-potties right inside the area where everyone lined up!

While everyone took shelter, I was busy warming up and doing my pre-race ritual. One of the things I like to do are some striders/accelerations before the race starts in order to get my muscles warmed up for the faster pace of the race. I usually run these striders in front of the pack of people lined up for the race, which is right in front of the start. I have to admit it is pretty exhilarating running fast in front of the spectators and makes me feel like an elite athlete (even though I am not). But this time when I tried to do this, I was informed by an official (volunteer) that I could not be running in this area. Oops. I tried to protest a little (which isn’t like me), but I backed off and had to walk way around to get back to the area everyone was lining up. I’ll just give a short recap on this race since there wasn’t anything particularly exciting or different.

Overall, I had a very good race. I felt good and strong the entire race. The only frustrating part was the fact I never knew what my average pace was or lap time. My GPS was not picking up a good signal on the wooden trails at all during the entire race. (Guess I’m a little too dependent upon it.)

I thought I was running around a 6:45 minute/mile pace throughout much of the race, but unfortunately my overall pace was 6:55 minutes/mile. I am still very happy with this time, but I was really hoping to break 1:30, which I would have needed a pace of 6:50. It doesn’t seem like much, and I would have liked to think I could have run 5 seconds per mile faster, but I also push myself very hard. I did spend the entire day prior to the race unpacking and organizing, so I was on my feet a lot. I would have liked to rest more, but I also wanted to get everything unpacked before the work-week started.

I was happy that I place 1st in my age group and 5th overall for the women. I can’t complain about that.

Picture prior to the race. The hat was a lifesaver in keeping the rain off my face.

This week I will wrap up a weekly mileage of about 80-82 miles. I was pretty exhausted on Monday and Tuesday but felt good during my 22 mile long run that I did today (Thursday) because I’m spending the weekend in San Francisco celebrating a friend’s 30th birthday!!

Catch you all later!