Run The Reagan Half Marathon Race Report — 2/14/09

What a good way to kick off the season!  My coach, Kevin Purcell (www.coachkp.com) and I have been working quite a bit on my running this off season.  While PR’ing in my last of race of 2008 at Ironman Florida was extremely rewarding, my run still needs quite a bit of work.  To provide a break from training, I signed up for the Run The Reagan Half Marthon in Snellville, GA. 

 The race has been around for about 14 or 15 years, and also features a 5K, 10K, fun walk, and family festival.  However the timing of the starts is done to reduce the likelihood that slower runners will impede faster runners.  The race itself is done on the Reagan Parkway, which is closed down to all traffic on the day of the race.  Combined with some extremely strong race organization, plenty of parking, easy access, and a good T-shirt, and you have yourself a first class event.  One suggestion if you are doing the race and coming from the Alpharetta/Johns Creek/Duluth area is to ignore the directions on the race website and instead take Sugarloaf Pkwy to Hwy 124 (Scenic Hwy).  If you head South on 124, the race start is about 3-4 miles down on your right hand side.

 The race course itself is an out-and-back, and I’d describe it as challenging but fair.  If you are wondering about pacing, the course elevation profile should be considered — the first half has quite a few fast downhill sections, but you get to visit the same ones on the way back home.  There are water stops every 1 1/2 miles, and half of those also have Powerade.

It turned out to be a good day for me, and I wound up with a 1 minute half marathon PR — no complaints there.  In training for it, I’ve been doing a lot of mid-tempo runs with strides at the end, and progressive runs where I increase the pace every 15-30 minutes (depending on the run length).  It sure paid off here!

Next up is the Charles Harris 10K, and then some pretty focused training for the Ironman 70.3 in New Orleans.