Rock 'n' Roll DC Half Marathon Recap

I had not planned to run R'nR DC this year again, but last summer, Rock 'n' Roll offered a switch for those who would not make it to Virginia Beach. I took the transferred and wiped the expectations and tears off. In December, RnR had a sale and I got Roger a registration for the half marathon as well.
 
Race Details
Cost : $50 (purchased during the Running day sale, originally for Virginia, then transferred to DC)
Goodies: Plastic Drawstring bag, samples, coupons, woman's cut tech shirt. Water and Gatorade at the finish line. Plus course entertainment.
Weather: 27, with windchills and real feel of 17-22. Sunny.

Last year when I did R'n'R DC, I did it in 1:58:59, and I thought it was a realistic goal to try and beat that time this year. The course is *relatively* flat, with a major hill at mile 6, and small rolling hills after. But not pancake flat that it would hurt.

A week before, the weather the forecast kept changing. At some point, it was showing possible rain and temps of 37. OMG... Did I bore you with my weather talk? I think I bored myself!! Final weather for the day, 27, with wind chills and *real feel* of 17-22, depending on whether one was in the sun or shade.
 
Roger kept giving me the forecast and telling me how cold it was going to be. I was not at all worried, and chose to block it out of my head. No need on worrying about something I can't change, so I focused on only worrying about my pace, the layers of clothes and the food, the things that were in my control. We have run in cold weather before, so I was not worried.
 
We stayed within 1 mile of the starting line, and ate our bagel and drank our coffee as we walked towards the start line.

 
I chose to wear my Reebok lined leggings, my lined black shirt, compression socks, Nike running sucks under those, my Nike hat and my Nike jacket.... I looked like a Nike sponsored runner wearing Nike all over... if only!

 
I was a little worried that my Nike jacket would be a bit too many layers, but decided that better sweating than cold. *** remind me of that thought later ***
 
Chaitali was able to switch me to an earlier wave, because the running gods put me on the very last wave, and I took off with Roger around 8:50 am.... hold right there for a moment... Right before we started, I was looking at the runners around us, and saw a Muslim woman, wearing a hijab, with the words *No Ban* written across her face. This made me very emotional, it brought tears to my eyes and for a moment, I couldn't calm myself. I could barely tell Roger about it, and he got worried that I was sick when he saw me wiping tears off my eyes. I told Roger that I wish I had made a sign that said "NO Wall, No deportations".

We took off running, and within the first mile, we ran by the White House.. At that moment, I decided to shout "No Wall, NO deportations" towards the White House as I ran. It felt so good!!

I saw my first split, and decided to pick it up a bit to make this goal. My lungs and my legs felt good the entire time, I didn't feel cold at all. But my feet felt tight and I started to have a weird pain on the sides, stronger on the left side of my left food. I tried changing my stride and gait, and that helped a little. But the cold or the excitement got me and I kept alternating between pain and different foot landing. I told myself to toe strike on hills and mid strike on flats, but again, got too excited.

I got really hot after mile 3, and contemplated several times on ditching my jacket. Somewhere my rational side kicked in and told me to not ditch my jacket because 1. It was expensive 2. it's my favorite jacket and 3. I would need it after the race to stay warm.

My favorite of running DC is the crowd support, and all the signs. Below are my favorites

*Nasty Women Run The world
*You are winning this Race #alternativefacts
*You Are going to Win this race, don't worry, I already called Russia.
* You are Almost done #alternative facts < this was at mile 10.
*Run faster, the person in front of you just farted

The race felt a lot more crowded this year than last year, so I weaved around a lot.

On mile 12.5, my favorite Bunbury Song came on... which might become my race finishing song. I sang it loudly, as you can always expect me to!



I had no idea what my time was so far, my watch was buried under my jacket and I didn't want to mess with finding it. But I did start to run a bit faster.

Rock 'n' Roll races have this little habit of finishing races on an uphill, and that hurts! Between the pain on my foot and my exhaustion, I couldn't run up the hill faster. But I turned up the music and tried my hardest. I did slow down to put the song on repeat... my mistake!

I crossed the finish line and my watch said 2:01:03... but my distance said 13.30.

Few seconds before going to the floor

I got my medal, and walked to get my bags to change. When all of the sudden my left foot gave out on me and brought me to the floor! I wanted to cry so badly! everybody around me was cheerful and celebrating their completion of their half marathon, and I'm on the floor rubbing my foot and trying to get up!! I wanted to text my sister, but she wasn't there. Then I wanted to text somebody to tell them I was in pain and on the floor, but sucked it up and walked around without a shoe for a little bit.

After taking off the sweaty clothes

I stretched it and that seemed to help a little, and allowed me to walk. By this time we were in the open field and the wind rudely reminded me that it was below freezing temps. I grabbed Gatorade, water and went to get my bags and wait for Roger.

He finished at 2:22.

We met up and got a Lyft to get food after changing. After we ate, I was limping around and walking on my toes on the left foot, when Roger told me to walk normal to help my foot. He must have been too hungry to think straight, because he didn't' say this until after we ate.

After I started to walk normally, the pain subsided a lot! it only hurt after long periods of sitting. I am thinking it was a foot cramp, because it's not even sore right now.

This is one of my favorite races, but unfortunately I will not be doing it next year. That makes me a little sad. But I would very much recommend this race!

 

****Race Time last review: This is the last time I will be thinking about my time for this race. My official race time was 2:00:58. But Garmin has me finishing 13.1 at 1:59:21. I will go by the official race time and not give it a thought again ***

 

When is it acceptable to Weather Stalk?

What is your favorite race sign?

What do you mentally block from your head in races?

Have you ditched clothes in races? I threw out a nice jacket once.

What is the coldest temperature you have run on?

Do you have a race finishing song?

Any ideas on what happened to my foot? it doesn't hurt now.