Wrap-Up from the Philadelphia Marathon

As I may have mentioned on this blog previously, this weekend I ran the Philadelphia Marathon. Three of my co-workers also ran the race. We all went out to dinner in Philly the night before the race at an Italian restaurant called Bella Cena. Most of us runners ate the linguini with grilled chicken. It was delish! We all had a blast. Above from left to right is Rassii (who I work with), Theresa, Aaron, Sara (who I work with and also cat sits for Maude), me, Stephanie (my boss) and her friend Gil. 

Originally, I had a hotel in Philly for two night, but I changed my mind and decided to stay with my Mom who lives a little more than an hour outside of the city. I drove to Philly on Saturday to pick up my race packet and have dinner with my co-workers. I drove to my Mom's Saturday night and back in to Philly early Sunday morning.

The race was supposed to start at 7 a.m., but was delayed a bit for some unknow security reason. In the 90 minutes I was in the city prior to the race beginning, I used one of the these portable johns three times, including a quick run out of the running corral after the starting gun.  It took my group about 18 minutes to get the starting line after the first runners started running. I managed not to have to stop during the race to go to the bathroom.



Stephanie, me, Sara, Rassii, and Theresa

I met up with my co-workers before the start. You might notice I'm holding my blue sponge in this shot. Sadly, when I took off my hat, gloves, and sweatshirt before the race, I lost my blue sponge. It was time for a new sponge anyway. The worst thing I forgot to do was use my nipple guards. I spent much of the run holding my shirt out away from my chaffed nips. 



 Behind me is the famous statue of Rocky in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art wearing the official marathon shirt. 

This is me at the finish with the art museum in the background. My finish time, according to my chip, was 4 hours, 5 minutes and 43 seconds. Out of 10,082 runners that completed the race, I was 4,444th. Out of the 486 men in my age division (50-54), I was 215th. My average pace was 9 minutes and 22.4 seconds per mile. I completed the half marathon in 1 hour, 57 minutes and 48 seconds, but could not keep up that pace in the second half, though I did not walk except to get water/gatorade at the drink stations along the way. I tried not to walk much when I did that--usually less than 30 seconds or so. I also did stop once briefly at an aid station to get a band-aid for my nip. It didn't stay on long though.

This marathon was a personal record for my fastest marathon. I have run each one a little faster so far. The last one I ran was the Marine Corp in October of 2008, which I ran in 4 hours, 22 minutes and 32 seconds. I improved on that one by 17 minutes and 11 seconds. Although I did not make my goal of running a marathon in under 4 hours, I am going to give it another try. I am set to run the Miami Marathon at the end of January 2012. Maybe I can be a sub-4-hour marathoner then.