Time for a much-belated race report:
My beautiful wife, Laura, has the goal of running a half marathon in every state, so for the past couple years we've been doing races around the Florida panhandle (the Big Beach 1/2 Marathon was pretty eventful when I inadvertently dressed as a pacer, all the way down to having "pacer" written on the back of my shirt).
This year, Laura checked off Louisiana. We drove from Laura's parents' condo in Pensacola for about five hours to Baton Rouge. When arrived, we paid a small fortune to park next to our hotel. It would have been cheaper to park valet, but we figured after the tip it would have come out in the wash. We walked from our hotel to the expo where we got our race numbers and shirts. We also found out about a race morning mass.
After a nice meal at the hotel restaurant, we settled into bed to get up early the next morning for the race.
Race morning we got to get a grab-and-go breakfast that the hotel provided, and we headed to St. Joseph Cathedral to partake in a 26.2 minute pre-race mass. The mass actually lasted a little longer than 26.2 minutes as they had the Eucharist, so the large crowd of runners took a while to get through communion.
The priest was also a runner, so he emphasized that the cathedral had bathrooms available. After the mass, however, I thought there would be a long line, so I told Laura we should just use the port-o-potties at the race start.
Counting on the port-o-potties turned out to be a mistake. After waiting in line for about 15 minutes, I realized there was no way we were going to make it to the start on time. I didn't really have to go, so I decided I'd risk having to stop mid-race to use the bathroom.
When I got to the start, it was a repeat of the Madison Marathon where I got myself stuck way back in the crowd. I weaved through to try and get closer to the start, but people were packed into the starting corral, so it was difficult and slow going. As the race was about to start, I saw Laura weaving through the crowds in front of me. I guess I need to take lessons from her in moving through a tightly packed crowd.
The route through Baton Rogue was decent, but I really didn't pay attention too much as I was focused on getting through the crowd. My first 10K split was 7:47/mile, and my overall pace for the race was 7:21, so I was able to pick up the pace quite a bit after getting through the crowds.
My finishing time was 1:38:56. A far cry from my fastest time, but I was happy with it for the amount of training I've been doing (about 20 miles per week) as opposed to averaging around 50 to 60 miles per week when I was at my peak.
When I got to gear check after the race, I reached for my gloves that I had put in my pockets. Laura had bought them for me for my birthday, and I really liked them. Unfortunately, I only had one in my pocket. I walked back to gear check and asked them if anyone had seen a glove, but they had not.
So, I walked to the finish line to cheer for Laura and get a picture of her finishing. When she came through the chute, she informed me that she'd found my glove around mile 6. "I was 90% sure it was yours," she said.
The post-race food and drink were awesome. They had chocolate milk, a post-race favorite for me. Then, we had five tokens to pick out the food and drink we wanted. I got some vegetarian gumbo, seafood gumbo, vegetarian jambalaya, and a couple beers.
Laura and I had a great trip, and I'm looking forward to whatever destination race she picks out next time.
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