Rock 'n' Roll Half Race Report

Ok second attempt at posting this, my computer ate the first version.

Warning, my first attempt was reasonably long and detailed so I have decided to introduce an:

Executive Summary
Had to go to Arizona for work, found out that The Rock n Roll half was on while I was there, travelled over, ran the race and posted 4 PB's and was very impressed with the organisation and running of the race. (thought it might make life easy for a blog review!)

Pre Race
After confirming I was required to visit Arizona for work (my company's head office is based there) I did a quick search for a Striders style running group to do a run with during my visit. Found that the second annual Rock 'n' Roll Marathon and Half were on when I was there so decided to have a crack at the half.

Departed Sydney on the Saturday, to arrive in Phoenix, via Los Angeles at about the same time on the Saturday. Given I was running the next morning I was meticulous in regards to hydrating etc and also attempted to realign my body clock on the flight to avoid jet lag. Managed about 4 hours sleep over the Pacific. After picking up the rental car and checking in at the hotel I headed off the the race registration to pick up my kit, number and chip. This was being held at an exhibition centre with an accompanying expo. Very smooth registration process and the expo was massive!

For those that have visited Sydney or Melbourne exhibition halls this filled up one complete hall. There were all sorts of stands : a massive range of event specific souvineer clothing, heaps of running gear vendors, all of the major shoe manufacturers, a lot of different sports drink/gu/bar suppliers, other US marathons promoting for entry and then some other stuff like a place that specialises in creating special stands to hold and display your different finishers medals. I picked up a few bars and gus and after a bit of a look around headed off. A major problem in getting the car out, there was a traffic jam in the parking station and it took close to an hour to get the car out!

Headed back to the hotel for dinner, the stomach was starting to complain a little about being given food when not expecting it and then not being given food when it usually was. I sorted out dinner with some chinese and keep up the rehydration regime, finally hitting the sack at around 9pm.

Up the next morning at 5am to sort myself out and drive to the finish line. Thankfully the predictions of rain did nott seem to hold up and while it was a little chilly (hey it is the middle of winter!) I'd say the temperature was around the same as at the City to Surf start. Parked the car in the parking station near the finish and then boarded one of the waiting shuttle buses to take me to the start area, all very efficient. Got to the start area and there were people everywhere! They had around 18,000 running the half and another 11,500 running in the marathon. The start area was amazing, heaps and heaps of portaloos, with the obligitary queues. But then also supplies of fresh fruit, bagels (what is it with bagels in the US?), coffee and water. I wandered around soaking up the atmosphere and headed over to look at the Marathon start. The Marathon and half had 2 separate start lines, one block apart and totally different courses all the way until the finish.

On the way I stopped off at a portaloo queue and was amazed at the casual approach that a lot of runners for the marathon had. It was 10 minutes to the start and they were still arriving and waiting in line without any stress! After watching the start I sorted out my gear to dropoff. Another great system here where your race bib had a detachable section that you cable tied to your bag, very easy to identify. The best bit then was they had around 20 UPS vans backed up, each with a section of runners allocated by surname. You just find the right van and drop off your stuff! The other great feature they had was a series of corrals, 19 for the half marathon, all based upon your approximate finishing time. As it happens I was put into corral number 1! With nothing else to do I entered the corral and lounged around. I should have made another loo stop but more of that later.

Again I was amazed at the casual approach, no big crowds, in fact with 15 minutes to go there would have only been say 20 people in my corral! I think this is because the US runners are so much more used to chip timing and base their performance on chip rather than gun time. Anyway chugged some more water and watched as a couple of running Elvis's gained a bit of attention, it seemed they were locals. I felt the need to visit the portaloos but the queues looked too long. Given the sparse crowd it would have been difficult to do a City to Surf job so I decided to hang on and hope it wouldn't get worse. With about 5 minutes to go I was expecting a whole heap of elites to be shuffled in in front of us but only a handful, so I was about 1 row back from the front, amazing! They did the national anthem thing with some Marines holding the flags and a few Arizona American Idol entrants singing and then Senator John McCain did a quick speech before firing the gun.

The actual run
Anyone still reading??
Given my prime start position there was no jostling and we went off down a long wide street. One of my identified prerace challenges was going to be pacing/splits given this would be marked in miles, so I had the trusty GPS riding shotgun to keep me honest. Was just focussing on a good efficient pace and so was surprised that the first beep from the watch indicating one kilometer showed 3:52! So I decided to ease up a little but still hit the next km with a 3:59. Despite still looking to ease up a little my third km came in at 3:48 and so I just (unofficially due to GPS measuring) broke my 3km PB with a 11:38 (the old one being 11:40 in July at Homebush for a Striders 10km).

Now I was a little worried but still felt really good, to distract myself I was also trying to do mental maths as at each mile marker they also had a timer so you could work out your splits so I was trying to determine if the GPS was maybe a bit out. At the 5km mark I found out, as they actually had a timing mat down and my official 5km time was 19:51, another PB! (previous was again the Homebush run with 19:57). Still too fast, and I still had another 16.1km to go.

On the course at around every mile they had different bands playing (thus the Rock 'n' Roll) and then each other half mile there were local cheerleading squads, I have to say you did seem to pick up the pace going past these groups, especially when they saw the Striders singlet and yelled out about Sydney! Coming up to 10km and I had slowed down a little. Another timing mat gave me an official 10km time of 41:18, thus another PB (once again bettering the Homebush run of 41:24).

I thought bugger it, just keep on going. As usual my race tactics see me in a state of never die wondering mode. The next 5km or so were all at around my original goal pace of 4:15 as I continued the mental math but also started to deal with both an urgent need to pee while also my travellers tummy was complaining. A wierd split from the GSPS at around 15km had me worried and I knew I was slowing a little. No surprise I'm sure to the experienced readers given my fast start.

The last 5-6km did see me slip in my pace a little and I felt some cramping/stitches in my gut but I had some time up my sleeve to still give 90 minutes shake. The last 2 km or so was through the Tempe (a large suburb of Phoenix where Arizona State Uni is) shopping district and there was a large crowd lining the streets. At this point I was in just get me to the line mode, not sure as to how I was going given the wierd split around 15km and unable to focus enough to convert from miles to km. Finally it seemed we were close as the Sun Devil Stadium became visible and I consciously picked up the pace. Then I could see a timer which was in the 89's and knew I must have only been a few 100 metres at the most from the finish, As I rounded the bend I could see the line but the clock had just clicked over to 90 so just ran it out to the line. Just near the line the commentator saw the Striders singlet and asked if I was from Australia and I did the thumbs up, the crowd gave a big cheer as I crossed the line with 90:25 showing, a new PB over my previous time of 93:44 set at Lane Cove in the Striders half in September.

Post race
More great organisation with a space blanket, water and finishers medallion handed out in progress as I made my way to be dechipped. Then into a large area with sports drink, fruit, more bagels, water and even Krispy Kreme mini donuts! Sat down and had a chat with another finisher for a little while but then had to get going. Very smooth gear pick up, all of the UPS trucks had parked in a big parking lot, very efficient. I made my way past the marathon finish line and they were just getting to 2:50 when I went past. The crowd was in the middle between the half and full finish lines and there was a lot of atmosphere! Got the car and went back to the hotel for a cold bath, then a shower and prepare for the drive up to Sedona for work.

All in all a great experience, I ended up finishing 178th out of 15,848 finishers. The organisation of this event was an eye opener and while it cost me around 100 AUD it certainly was worth it and I would be sure to contemplate running in another US race if and when the opportunity arises in the future. I'm sure that if I had been a little calmer in the first phase of the race I probably would have broken 90 but am stoked to have been able to perform the way I did really on the back of one months training since resuming after the groin injury. Am now very positive about breaking my shorter distance PB's just need to work out how to push myself harder or run more efficiently when I'm trying to run fast. Somewhat on target for Canberra but need to run twice the distance at just a shade faster pace as well. Can't argue with 3 official PB's and one unofficial one however!

Oh and some photos are here http://www.asiorders.com/view_user_event.asp?EVENTID=4353&BIB=21819

The guts took a couple of days to settle down, interestingly no issues with my problematic blisters on the heels but I do notice my adductors are still both sore, hopefully not related to my recent groin injury.