Race Report: Texas Half, Dallas

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Oh boy. Was this ever a comedy of errors. (Mine, not the organizers'.) I forgot to set my alarm
(fortunately I had a backup just in case), my watch was dead and I couldn't find my backup, and I
got to the race late for still more reasons I *won't* go into here. I did manage to scrape up a
chip, but they'd turned off the starting mat by the time I got down there.

The race itself was around White Rock Lake, an agreeable venue, even on a breezy 34-degree day. The
course was a tadpole: Out, loop, and back. The loop went through some fairly nice woodsy residential
areas; the rest was along the lake.

I caught the tail end of the racers right at the 1-mile mark and started passing people -- now
there's a nice feeling! At the first few mile markers I asked people if they had the race or clock
time, enough to determine that I was somewhere around my goal of an 8-minute pace, but it wasn't
clear how much time I'd lost; somewhere between 10 and 14 minutes. I caught up to a co-worker,
offered some words of encouragement and soldiered on. There were a few hills, chiefly on a couple of
overpasses, but the course was mostly flat. The last few miles were into the wind. They had water in
enough places that I could take my gels about where I wanted to.

Finally I crossed the line about 1:57:40; my best guess is that I was about 11 minutes late, so I'm
entering this as a 1:46:30, a bit slower than the 1:45 I was shooting for but not too bad, all
things considered.

Post-race food was bagels and bananas plus beer; the bagels went fairly fast.

My only gripe beyond the somewhat meager food is that we had to share the road with a lot of cars;
one, going against traffic in the only open lane, was actually weaving in and out of the stream of
runners as it dodged other cars. Bleh. Most of the time the cops at the intersections were doing a
good job, though.

Three stars. Brian Bob says check it out.

--
Brian P. Baresch Fort Worth, Texas, USA Professional editing and proofreading

If you're going through hell, keep going. --Winston Churchill

>and I got to the race late for still more reasons I *won't* go into here.

S-E-X

>My only gripe beyond the somewhat meager food is that we had to share the road with a lot of cars;

Lets ask them how they felt about you and a few hundred others running by in your Siderman or Batman
costumes, blocking the road and holding them up.

Bill R.

>Holy Twilight Zone! FWIW, I am Texas-sized impressed that you finished without bustin' a gut
>laughin' at this one.

Would you believe that I've done this sort of thing before? About 12 years ago I entered a 10-mile
race where they moved the starting line after the course maps were printed; there was a notice at
the packet pickup but I forgot. Naturally I arrived at the original starting line right on time,
which meant I heard the gun go off a block and a half away. Oops!

That one went kind of like this one except I had a watch and a good idea how much time I lost (about
1:30). Also I think my gun time (as well as my watch time) was better than it would have been -- I
was trying harder to get "caught up". The guy I passed right before the finish told me afterward
that I was the only person to pass him after the first mile.

>If you need sworn, legal, step-outside testimony that you did it under 1:45, have them give me a
>call - I was there and timed you.

It's a deal! Boy, we having fun now, eh?

Next weekend should be a lot of fun too -- I'm running a 10K that's paired with the local marathon,
then joining a friend for the last 10K of the big one. Oh boy.

--
Brian P. Baresch Fort Worth, Texas, USA Professional editing and proofreading

If you're going through hell, keep going. --Winston Churchill