My toughest moment on the course occurred about three miles before the finish. My legs up until that point felt fresh. Turnover was quick, and my pace remained around a 7:45 minute per mile average, well under the goal I set going into the race. Undertrained due to a persistent injury, I still felt hesitant about my endurance and pace, so I might have started out too hard. In a long race, what feels good the first third or half often ends up turning into “what happened here?” when setting a hard pace early, even when you think it isn’t hard. When I registered for the San Antonio half-marathon many months ago I hoped to finish around 1:37. I knew this goal was out of reach due to the injury, and I didn’t want to push too hard in case I aggravated the injury. I deliberately kept the pace slow, or so I thought, but lack of recent racing meant my pace estimates were way off base.

In 2011 I ran the San Antonio full marathon course in steaming heat. That year, through the first 13 miles I felt like I was running on air, and hit the halfway mark at 1:41, around three minutes faster than my half-marathon PR. Then the sun broke through the clouds, the heat climbed several degrees, and a long slow hill crushed me by mile 20, sending my hopes of a 3:35 finish time into the ether. I finished in 3:50, struggling through the last 6 miles. A few months later, injured and apathetic, I improved my marathon PR by nine minutes in Houston, with cooler temperatures and better pacing. Still, I figured that if I trained for the full, and ran the half instead, I would skip the heat and break 1:40, and so I signed up with that goal in mind earlier this year.

However, the injury never quite went away. I took time off from running, and biked and swam instead. When I resumed running I discovered that there is no substitute for running if you want to run well, and it took a few weeks to build up decent mileage. Not the 50+ mile weeks I hoped for, but some long runs gave me the confidence that I knew I could finish the race.

I lined up near the back of corral number 2. I remember being in corral 4 two years ago, and weaving in and out among runners for several miles. It’s tougher further back, as I know from running the Austin marathon in 2010. I found myself running around some people the first mile, yet settled into what I thought was a comfortable pace just after the first mile, and the first few miles ran a fairly consistent pace. I kept my head down, alternated water and gatorade, and occasionally dunked water on my head to keep cool. Around mile three we passed huge crowds in front of the Alamo. There’s an urge here to speed up, high five and wave. I tried to stay within myself, and didn’t notice any significant increase in speed. Just before mile six we hit the only significant hill in the half-marathon course, zig-zagging through streets to the top of a hill before running down again towards downtown San Antonio. Around halfway down I started feeling some unexpected fatigue.

I had eaten a GU as we topped the hill, which helped the legs, and amid the buildings of downtown overcame some fatigue. We encountered small pockets of crowds here. At times young kids stuck out their hands for high fives, which now helped motivate me, and I plugged along, passing runners, getting passed – normal stuff. Then with three miles to go I felt the legs get heavy. Here I made a big mistake: I brought the wrong nutrition, blocks instead of more GU. I struggled getting through just two of them, and couldn’t eat more, which I know cost me some energy. I have used blocks in training runs, but at a slower pace and carrying my own water. This time it didn’t work. For two miles I slowed the pace, even considered walking for a moment, but when I passed the 12 mile marker I felt some energy return, and the last mile almost returned to my previous pace.

Shortly before the finish, as you run alongside the Alamodome, there is a short, steep hill. Here many people slow down or walk, but near the top I tried to speed up and managed a slow sprint after the hill evened into a 200 meter flat before the finish line. I squeaked out a PR with 1:43:06, about one and half minutes better than my previous half. In terms of the final results, I ended up number 442 out of 16,372 in the half, so in the top 2%. I think I have a better result still somewhere within myself, but I’ve learned there are many factors that I can’t control. Perhaps things will be different next year, perhaps they won’t. But I do intend to line up on November 17 and run that half-marathon again. Pushing the date back one week might work out with cooler weather, but in Central Texas the weather is never a sure bet.