Indy Mini (Half Marathon) 2016

May 7, 2016

Indy Mini - 7th 1/2 marathon

Indianapolis, IN

Time: 2:35:48; Pace 11:53

Div: 768/1673; Gender: 6114/13487; Overall: 13950/24770

This was a really well run race. My time sucked by I had a good time; as far as a good time running for 13.1 miles can get. 24,000 runners participated and were spread out over 26 corals. And the best part? Men Keflezighi started in the last coral so he could run with everyone. How cool!

Emily and I took Amtrak down to Indianapolis on Wednesday night before the race. We packed the next two days with walking all over the downtown area and lots of beer. Indy is a giant brewery town and we took advantage of its offerings! I'm not sure if it was all the beer and not so great diet two days prior to the race plus sleep the night before of the press pressed juice at the city market the day before but I spent the entire race with intestinal turmoil.

Suzan drove down friday afternoon and arrived just in time for dinner. Not thinking of being in a smaller city (less than 1 million) we neglected to make dinner reservations until friday afternoon. It didn't even dawn on us as we probably wouldn't have this issue in chicago. the only italian (pasta) place for where we could get a reservation was a mile from the hotel and not until 7:30. The service was kind of slow and we really took our time getting back making pit stops along the way. Needless to say we didn't get much sleep.

Luckily the hotel had free breakfast and was a few short blocks from the start line. I was so not feeling this race. I was wiped out and not feeling to hot and it WAS hot. Not boiling but a little more humid than we were used to in early May.

The course was wide and roomy. With 26 corals we started in the middle. this meant a lot to a slow runner like me. usually i start in the back and I finish in a trickle of runners across the finish line. This race I got to finish in a nice stream of runners and not feel like the sag van was right behind me.

The course started downtown, ran out into the neighborhoods , though Speedway City, took a lap around the Indy speedway and headed back downtown. Side note: downtown is very white and we were wondering where the rest of the people were. We scoped out the demographic info online and found there aren't a ton of minorities in Indy. well, now we know where the small percentage live. I was shocked to see the Seikh Society of America manning a water station. 

 There was lots of great entertainment along the way, some organized like older ladies line dancing or older ladies belly dancing (old people in this town have fun!) and lots of bands of all ages and music genres. Then there was the un organized entertainment like the kid and his mom in the front yard banging on pots.

 I knew I stopped around mile 3 or 4 to use the port-o-potty. Luckily there was TP still available. I was at a good pace and seemed relatively on track to make a PR. I always surprise myself because when I have  worst sleep and feel like ass, I tend to do well. I knew I should have stopped again around mile 6 before we entered the Indianapolis Speedway. But I didn't. I had no idea one lap around was going to be 2.5 miles of hell.