We arrived back in Buffalo Saturday night after a very nice week plus at
WDW. After very mild temps here all week (it was 60 on Friday) we were
greeted with a blast of winter. I didn't get over 20 deg yesterday.
Had a great time last week, we arrived on Thursday went to the Animal
Kingdom to see the Christmas Parade and then to MGM to see the Osbourne
lights - very nice.
Friday morning we hit the expo first thing, had to wait in line to get
into the building. Finally got our packets and did a little shopping.
Went to MGM again and had lunch at the Sci-Fi Diner before heading over
to Dixie Landings (sorry Port Orleans - Riverside). Got in the bus line
turned around and there was Wendy Sibley - caught me before I had a
chance to put on my Carpe Castle button that she mad for us several
years ago. It was very nice seeing old friends and meeting some new ones
who I only knew thru the list.
Woke early Saturday and headed down to the bus around 3:30 where we met
up with Bob Fraser. Buses didn't show up until around 4:15, we boarded
and had a very quick ride to the start. No traffic problems this year.
After a long walk to the corrals I entered Corral B which at the time
thought was good as I didn't want to start out too fast. Silly me, I
didn't think about the fact that the road ahead was very narrow and it
was very congested. After about a half mile of very slow jogging I
pulled out and ran on the grass passing lots of folks. Still my first
mile was over 10 minutes, and I couldn't move very well until we got
onto World Drive. I finally started to settle into a nice pace and
noticed my left calf tightening up. This hadn't happened to me in
training so I wasn't sure what I need to do. I think I must have been
landing incorrectly when we were going so slow in the beginning. I
tried landing differently but it wasn't working. I managed to make it
to the MK, but decided I needed to stop and stretch when I got to
Frontierland. That helped as I was able to run although my calf was
still sore. I hit the halway point in about 57:30 which is 1:55 pace.
Although I didn't have a specific time goal I had hoped to break 1:50.
So I just tried to make the best of it. I picked it up some after
stretch and by the time I got to 9 miles I felt as though I would be
able to make it to the finish without cramping which was a big concern.
>From there I started running a sub 8 min pace. I was hanging in there
with the exception of the final overpass which I had to jog up as both
of my calves were tight. When I got to 12 miles I started to open up my
stride a bit as I thought I could get close to 1:50. I ran the 13th mile
in 7:24 my fastest of the day and kicked it in but fell 9 secs short
finishing in 1:50:09. Mile splits were (10:02, 8:47, 8:14, 8:09, 8:40,
8:42, 8:58, 8:29, 8:22, 7:49, 7:42, 8:02, 7:24), approx half splits were
57:33, 52:36 so I had a pretty big negative split.
Looking back I was very happy about finishing my first half marathon run.
It did leave me wondering how well I would have done without the problems
starting and the calf injury. Hopefully I will do better in September at
Disneyland. I'm swithching my focus back to racewalking now until August
when I will begin training for Disneyland and the Marine Corps Marathon
which I plan to make my first running marathon.
Dave Lawrence
Buffalo, NY
