Rock 'N' Roll San Antonio

I took part in the half marathon at Rock 'N' Roll San Antonio this morning. Slap me if I say I want to do a mega-event like this again. I probably will still do it anyway, but I just need a reminder of what I'm setting myself up for.

I mistakenly thought that showing up two hours ahead of the race start would be enough time. As I surveyed the sea of brake lights around me at 5:30 a.m., I knew something was wrong. Without any traffic control, the line of cars waiting to get into the AT&T Center parking lot had backed up a mile onto Interstate 35. An hour later, I was finally parked and was ready to stand in the line for the shuttle buses.

I think it was around 8 a.m. or so that I finally made it to the start area, 30 minutes past the scheduled gun time. The pre-race plan was to meet up with Lacer from the RWOL forums in corral #11. Corral 11 was long gone by then, and I'm assuming Lacer was as well. So, already feeling tired, I launched my race with corral 25.

The first half went pretty well. The race organizers had already started taking down the mile markers by the time I got on the course, so I was depending a lot on my Garmin to give me pace feedback. I hit mile six at around 60 minutes. It wasn't long after that when I spotted a familiar-looking runner lady wearing red and the name "Katrina" glittered on the front. I said hello to the RWOL forum's Redsparkle and wished her well as she was going for 26.2 miles today.

Shortly after this, my race fell apart. I knew my training runs lately have been awful, and it was this point where it showed. I ended up walking frequently on the latter half of the race. My Garmin shows my elapsed time for the course at around 2:28, the likes of which I haven't seen in nearly two years. It was one of those races where I was mostly grateful to finish.

After finishing, I was presented with another hour-long wait to reclaim my gear bag. Then came the final line of the day to board the shuttle buses back to AT&T Center. This wait wasn't truly bad compared to the others, but the line went down one staircase and climbed another. I'm really glad I didn't run the full course today!

So, here's some final thoughts as I'm digesting pizza and chicken fried steak (the "100 calorie" packs of crackers and Dole fruit cups handed out at the post-race weren't quite enough):

1) When your race instructions say that the parking lot opens at 4:30 a.m., there's a reason for that.

2) Train badly, race badly.

3) If you can avoid checking in a gear bag, do so!

To put the race performance in perspective, I had PRed the half marathon distance with a 2:08 six months ago at the Flying Pig. Even last November in San Antonio, I ran a 2:13. So I'm having to deal with the reality that I'm less fit than I was just last year.

(later)

Tonight, I was able to let off some frustrations at the post-race concert headlined by The Cult. The band is still largely together, and they still rock! "Fire Woman," "Rain," and "She Sells Sanctuary" have held up well after all this time.