Icebreaker Indoor Half Marathon

My first race of the year was the Icebreaker Half Marathon held at the Pettit Center in Milwaukee, WI. I went into this race feeling a little undertrained but confident that I could maintain a good running pace throughout. This race was going to be a test for me to see where my body and mind were at. I haven't done much speedwork and figured I would be around the pace I have been pacing at with my Winter Warriors group, which is 10:30 - 11:00. I felt really tired up until the race and perked up finally right before we started.

This race is a mental challenge to begin with as you are running laps, 47.5 laps to be precise. I was hoping I could maybe run with Rachel again this year to make time fly by but I discovered she was slightly more prepared than I was for it. Start game face mode......

Rachel, Me, Matt & Sarah

I tried to keep an easy pace to start, there really is no way to judge your pace in this race without doing lots of math. There is no current pace to refer to on your watch, you see your lap times and overall times each lap around but again, who wants to do all that math. It's a great race to learn how to run by feel and not rely on gadgets. You have nobody to blame but yourself.

The first 45 minutes went by pretty quickly and then I started to get bored. They had tons of signs up around but many of them had too many words to try and read while running by and not tripping. There was music playing from what the runners requested on their race entry, but I noticed I didn't really hear it or just zoned it out. I really only remember one point when some guy ahead of my was jamming out and going crazy over a song that just came on. Likely this dude

I tried to find ways to distract my mind as I told myself I was not allowed to stop and walk. If I felt tired I would just slow my pace a bit until I felt better. I was thinking of my fellow warriors back home and trying not to let Rachel lap me several times! I mentioned to some spectators about 1.5 hrs in they were amazing, they stood on the edge of the mats the entire time and were there before we even started. That totally paid off as several laps they high fived me and gave me encouragement.

Finally when I hit 3 miles to go I knew I would have to slow up a bit as things were really starting to hurt, I had blisters on the right side of both my feet, and some pretty severe chaffing going on my arm. Why did I forget to body glide there? Oh yeah, only chaffed there once slightly during a marathon.

Carnage from three days later, this doesn't even do it justice.

Kim and Joan showed up about this time as well and it was great to see some friendly faces to cheer us in. Kim mentioned I looked strong yet and it was nice to hear even though I felt like I was starting to die. I really focused during the race to run with proper form and keep my body tall and not hunched over. This really helped me maintain a good pace and not use extra energy.

I am happy with my time and hope it will improve as I work towards losing some more weight and continued training.

2:12:29 (10:07 pace)
Division: 21/34
Gender: 36/62
Overall: 74/112

I got a couple of doozies from this race, thinking I may need to do a compilation for a year end post. Stay tuned!!