19 Aug 2018 - Skinny Raven Half Marathon



Wow, can't believe I was in Alaska!  Wow, it was a fabulous day.  The weather was perfect, the race went fantastic and my sweetie and I both ran and finished the race.

The Last Frontier.  Land of lots of snow and cold, long days, open spaces, tall mountains, moose, bears and bald eagles.  Of all the things I anticipated about Anchorage it was none of them.

Hotel
We stayed at the Voyager Inn.  Awesome Hotel.  Helpful staff.  They saved us money by telling us about free parking on Sunday.  Great breakfast.

Expo
Held in convention center close to our hotel.  Race packet with bib and long sleeve technical shirt.  Fun environment.  Met Jeff Galloway, bought his book.  Anxious to try the run-walk-run method.

Meeting Jeff Galloway was a thrill for me!

Saturday
Kids fun run and 1 mile race.  Separate race for Men, Women, and Military.

Sunday
3 different races:  49K(8am), Marathon(9am), and Half Marathon(930am).  Shared the same course.
Close walk from our hotel so we left the room at 840am, Checked out of our hotel and walked to the start in time to see the marathon start.  Bag checked coat for after the race.  Counted down and then we started running.  I was toward the front to avoid walkers.  First mile was downhill.  I wanted to run the 1st mile a bit faster because it was the only downhill of the race.  Ran this mile in 8:05.  Then the course flattened out and slightly uphill for the next 6 miles.  The sun was out for the first 3-4 miles but the run was along a path that was shaded so it didn't bother me.  It felt good to run in the cooler weather.  In fact the second half of the run was in drizzly rain and I loved it.  I felt great almost the whole run.  Around mile 11 I started to feeling a little fatigued but knew I had a chance for sub-2 hour so kept pushing.  The second half of the run up to mile 12 was slightly downhill so that helped.  The hill at the end was tough but I saw an old guy that may have been in my age group so I was determined to catch him.  I pushed on the hill and caught him just before the top of the hill then I kicked it in and pushed hard the last 1/4 mile to the finish strong.  The dude ended up being about 10 years older than me but what the heck I appreciated the motivation he gave me!   Race time:  1:59:07  I was so excited as I seriously doubted I could run another sub-2 hour half marathon.


Start line.

Hanging with my sweetie before the race.


Half marathoners are getting ready to go..

Views from the race.

Bagpipes being played up on the hill.

On course drum players.

Second group of drummers on the course.

Excited to see Julie on the race course,

It's all downhill from here.

More scenery along the race course.

Here she comes finishing strong!

Alaska half marathon finishers!


What's next for me?

February 2019 - Rock and Roll New Orleans half marathon
September 2019 - My first ever Ironman event.  The Atlantic City Ironman 70.3 race.

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