HOBBLER HALF MARATHON
Ben and I caught a bus to the start fairly early, wanting to get up to the start with plenty of time to warmup a little and use the bathroom. While warming up we saw Justin Park, which was a nice surprise. I haven't seen Justin in quite awhile, so it was good to catch up. We did a few strides and then we were off.
I got out pretty quickly, in hindsight probably too quickly since conservative starts have really been working well for me lately, and I split mile one in 4:58. Ben and another guy were with me in that first mile. By mile two I had a bit of a gap running a 4:54. Mile three was more of the same in 4:58.
Then in mile 4 I had another throw-up burp (like what started my problems at Ogden in May). I was pretty annoyed since I had literally only taken 1-2 ounces of GU-brand electrolyte drink. There's no way that should bother me like that, just like a couple ounces of Gatorade shouldn't have at Ogden. But it does for some reason. After this point in the race I was constantly supressing the urge to throw up from time to time in the race. Luckily it never happened. But mile four suffered a bit on pace with this happening (5:06).
Mile five was back to sub-5:00 miles in 4:58. During mile six you go off the road and hit a dirt trail and eventually the paved pathway down the canyon. I could hear cheering behind me at the aid station I had just passed and it wasn't as far back as I would've expected. So either Ben was killing it today or some guy I don't know was running very well. Mile six was 5:02. The pathway, especially early on before crossing to the South side of the road, is very rolling with some steep up and downhill. But overall it still drops pretty good, so the rolling nature only slows you down 5-7 seconds per mile than the previous miles in the canyon. Mile seven was 5:02, mile eight was 5:04, and mile nine was 5:06.
Around mile ten you turn left and start heading out toward Mapleton. You drop down a hill and then climb back up another one. This mile has the biggest climb in the race, but it's really not much (maybe 30 feet). I hadn't anticipated running the course this direction. The original course doesn't turn here. Last year due to construction they re-routed South like this, but I thought the website had said they were going back to the original course this year...well apparantly not. The course last year was short, according to Fritz's race report it was around 12.9? So now I was kind of annoyed that I was probably running a short course. Anyway, mile ten was 5:12.
Miles 11-13 was just me kind of holding on and trying to stay motivated to run fast. If it wasn't a full length course then the time really didn't matter much, just place. But I stayed as motivated as I could, and actually in the end the course was pretty close to the full distance, as I had it at 13.09. After Justin mentioned that he thought they added one extra small block, which likley made up the distance (he also ran last year). Mile 11 was 5:05, mile 12 was 5:16, and mile 13 was 5:01. After I realized the course was close to accurate I pushed the last little bit at 4:33 pace to finish in 1:06:10, which is the fastest time to ever win the Hobbler Half. But I don't know if you can count it as a course record since the course was modified this year and last.
I finished and was catching my breath when I heard the announcer say that the second place runner was coming in. I looked and saw Ben finishing. I was blown away at how fast he'd run! He ran something like a 1.5-minute PR. It was awesome!
For some reason, even though this was my best time of the year (and actually my second best time ever), I feel like I didn't run very well. I didn't think those early sub-5:00 miles would feel as fast as they did on the downhill. I also thought with the cool weather and another month of training I could run substantially faster than I did at Utah Valley. But the effort in the end is about the same since this was basically a 1:06:25 effort (I add 15 seconds since it was 13.09 and most certified courses show up 13.15-ish). Then you also have more downhill in this one (about 200 feet more). But, I'll take it and move on.
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