I drove up to SLC Thursday evening and stayed at a friend's house to run the Deseret News Half. I wanted to see where my fitness was at. Overall, I was mildly dissapointed with my race. I was hoping to run 1-2 minutes faster, but it is what it is. My previous best 1/2 marathon was last year's Little Grand Canyon where I ran 1:29:24. I did run the 2nd half of St George in 2013 in 1:27:30--so this was a PR by a little bit.
Got up early Friday and got on the buses--ended up at the start with 75 minutes to kill. Tried to stay warm in a tent, then did a little warm-up and took care of business out in the bushes. Splits were as follows:
1--6:07 Perhaps a little fast but it was the fastest mile on the course and I was still behind some chubby guy with a 1/2 gallon of water in a camelback. After the first mile I caught 2 people and 3 people passed me......so overall the pacing was probably alright.
2--6:22
3--6:28
4--6:29
5--6:40 a little bit of uphill coming out of the canyon
6--6:27
7--6:24
8--6:44 Uphill/flat towards research park
9--6:16 Triathlete guy passed me here and I stayed with him until the next hill
10--6:43 Some uphill before dropping down to South Temple
11--6:43 Should have been faster but I hit a wall of walkers from the 10K
12--6:44 Weaving in and out of 10K people, could no longer see triathlete guy
13--7:10 Calves were cooked--I was ready to be done.
.2 @ 7:14 pace.
Overall average pace on my watch was 6:34.
Ran a couple of slow miles cooldown back up to the U to get my truck. Took an icebath afterwards before heading home.
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