Brian Baresch
I ran the half at the Dallas White Rock Marathon as a training run, aiming for goal marathon pace
(about 7:25 per mile, or a 1:37:30 pace for the half). I love 'thons in large part because they tend
to be festive and exciting with lots of people cheerfully taking on a difficult challenge, and this
one was all that, even for us less ambitious half entrants. This was the first time White Rock had a
standalone half instead of a 2-person relay, so the course was new; basically it followed the full
marathon course for about 6.5 miles, then cut across town to rejoin the full course shortly in mile
22, or just after the "Dolly Parton hills".
Several people I knew were running either the half or the full, and I looked for them but couldn't
pick them out of the crowd of about 6,000 runners. One person did pick me out, the Big Guy, my
friendly rival from the past two summers. He said he hasn't run 13 miles in quite a while and was
just out for some fun.
After the national anthem, including fireworks and a flyover by three fighter jets, the gun went off
and we slowly started forward. It took me and BG about a minute to get to the starting mats. We
headed under the freeway and through the nightclubby West End ex-warehouse district, where, with the
street still choked with runners, we had to squeeze past a city bus idling by the curb, the driver
looking somewhat befuddled. After that the congestion started to ease. We passed mile 1 in 8:50 and
I sped up a bit. Mile 2, along the trolley tracks on fashionable McKinney Avenue, was still around
8:00; my race strategy of going out at what feels like training pace to avoid blowing up early had
backfired, as it occasionally does, and I actually *was* going at training pace. I cranked it up one
more time. BG was with me sometimes, ahead or behind me sometimes; he's very much an in-the-moment
runner. By this time we were running along Turtle Creek, a real pretty part of town. There were a
few hills but nothing real bad IMHO. Somewhere along the creek BG's ebullience took over and he
started shouting, "Look at all these people running! You're all nuts!" I hollered back, "Takes one
to know one!" We were having a good time.
The water tables were reasonably plentiful and enthusiastically staffed. They did a useful thing:
Water was in red cups, Powerade in blue cups. Made it easier to grab what we wanted. Crowd support
was relatively sparse (by big 'thon standards anyhow) but unfailingly energetic; a lot of people had
signs with cheers for their favorite runners or generic "Go" messages. A number of pretty good bands
were playing, including a couple in the half-only portion of the course; it was nice to see that.
(One band was on the big TV screen near the finish several times playing a White Rock Marathon song:
"I'm gonna run me a marathon, it's the Dallas White Rock Marathon" ... "Gotta start training when
it's 102, learn to run for four hours on nothing but goo" -- something like that. Fun!)
I was sort of in the pace groove by this time, hitting 7:15 to 7:30 fairly well. (Next MP run I'm
bringing my pedometer, dangit.) I'd lost BG but could sometimes still hear him back behind me,
yelling goofy stuff and having fun. Somewhere in mile 7 the course split and we lost the full
'thoners and relay runners, or about half the field. We ran south and east for a couple of miles.
The mile 7 marker was AWOL -- I thought I might just have missed it, but later I compared notes
with a buddy and he hadn't seen it either, so it probably wasn't there. At mile 8 my two-mile split
was 13:48, meaning I'd just run two 6:54 miles -- highly unlikely. I think that segment was short.
Most of the later miles seemed about right, so I suspect the half-mara course was short overall,
maybe by 500 feet, possibly more. There was a mile 9 marker, but by this time we were back on the
full course so I just used those markers for splits. ISTR that some of the later half-mara markers
were absent as well.
We rejoined the main course on Swiss Avenue, a nice, tree-lined boulevard that heads more or less
constantly downhill for about 3 miles with a good view of the downtown skyline up ahead. I was
cruising at about my intended pace, passing a few people, getting passed. One nice thing about doing
this as a tempo run: I didn't care about my finishing place so I didn't have to worry who passed me
or anything like that. We crossed some rough street where they were doing some construction, went
back through the West End and headed in toward the finish. I stuck with my pace and watched the guys
around me sprint for the line. Over the mats in 1:37:56 chip time, a post-high school PR and
reasonably close to my goal, even allowing for the probably short course. I'll take it. (138th of
1208 men, 26th of 241 in AG; if I'd run all out and finished in, say, 1:35, I'd have been about
105th and 18th respectively.)
They gave me a nice medal and a space blanket and took my chip. I knew BG was probably not far back
so I hung around the finish to see if I could spot him, but I never did. (Turns out he finished
about 6:30 behind me, at the slow end of his informal goal range but a reasonable result for not
having trained specifically for the race.) Finally I went to get my jacket and went inside the
American Airlines Center, a fairly nice arena as arenas go, for food: Apples, bananas, oranges,
bagels, cookies, sweet rolls, pasta salad, tomato basil soup, beef chili (no thanks) and plenty of
water. They had long tables and chairs set up banquet-style and a good R&B band going.
Afterward I ended up taking care of a running bud for some time. She finished the full in just under
4 hours, with upset stomach and mild hypothermia; she wanted to wait till her BF met her in the
finish area but decided she had to get to first aid, so I accompanied her there. I made a couple of
forays out into the crowd to look for him but no luck. Finally she was back on her feet but
underdressed for the weather (her BF had her clothes and car keys), so I hung out with her; we
looked in the food arena, at her car and in the finish area for more than an hour before coming
across him -- he'd been doing the same thing and we kept missing each other. I think they're gonna
invest in a cell phone or two.
So. Good support on the course. Good traffic control on the course except for that friggin' bus in
the West End. Good course. Good bands. Good weather. Reasonably good organization. Points off for
missing mile markers for the bastard-child half-marathoners and probably short course. (I'm
confident the full 'thon course was spot on.)
Three and a half stars (woulda been four if the course had been correct and fully marked). 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
(about 7:25 per mile, or a 1:37:30 pace for the half). I love 'thons in large part because they tend
to be festive and exciting with lots of people cheerfully taking on a difficult challenge, and this
one was all that, even for us less ambitious half entrants. This was the first time White Rock had a
standalone half instead of a 2-person relay, so the course was new; basically it followed the full
marathon course for about 6.5 miles, then cut across town to rejoin the full course shortly in mile
22, or just after the "Dolly Parton hills".
Several people I knew were running either the half or the full, and I looked for them but couldn't
pick them out of the crowd of about 6,000 runners. One person did pick me out, the Big Guy, my
friendly rival from the past two summers. He said he hasn't run 13 miles in quite a while and was
just out for some fun.
After the national anthem, including fireworks and a flyover by three fighter jets, the gun went off
and we slowly started forward. It took me and BG about a minute to get to the starting mats. We
headed under the freeway and through the nightclubby West End ex-warehouse district, where, with the
street still choked with runners, we had to squeeze past a city bus idling by the curb, the driver
looking somewhat befuddled. After that the congestion started to ease. We passed mile 1 in 8:50 and
I sped up a bit. Mile 2, along the trolley tracks on fashionable McKinney Avenue, was still around
8:00; my race strategy of going out at what feels like training pace to avoid blowing up early had
backfired, as it occasionally does, and I actually *was* going at training pace. I cranked it up one
more time. BG was with me sometimes, ahead or behind me sometimes; he's very much an in-the-moment
runner. By this time we were running along Turtle Creek, a real pretty part of town. There were a
few hills but nothing real bad IMHO. Somewhere along the creek BG's ebullience took over and he
started shouting, "Look at all these people running! You're all nuts!" I hollered back, "Takes one
to know one!" We were having a good time.
The water tables were reasonably plentiful and enthusiastically staffed. They did a useful thing:
Water was in red cups, Powerade in blue cups. Made it easier to grab what we wanted. Crowd support
was relatively sparse (by big 'thon standards anyhow) but unfailingly energetic; a lot of people had
signs with cheers for their favorite runners or generic "Go" messages. A number of pretty good bands
were playing, including a couple in the half-only portion of the course; it was nice to see that.
(One band was on the big TV screen near the finish several times playing a White Rock Marathon song:
"I'm gonna run me a marathon, it's the Dallas White Rock Marathon" ... "Gotta start training when
it's 102, learn to run for four hours on nothing but goo" -- something like that. Fun!)
I was sort of in the pace groove by this time, hitting 7:15 to 7:30 fairly well. (Next MP run I'm
bringing my pedometer, dangit.) I'd lost BG but could sometimes still hear him back behind me,
yelling goofy stuff and having fun. Somewhere in mile 7 the course split and we lost the full
'thoners and relay runners, or about half the field. We ran south and east for a couple of miles.
The mile 7 marker was AWOL -- I thought I might just have missed it, but later I compared notes
with a buddy and he hadn't seen it either, so it probably wasn't there. At mile 8 my two-mile split
was 13:48, meaning I'd just run two 6:54 miles -- highly unlikely. I think that segment was short.
Most of the later miles seemed about right, so I suspect the half-mara course was short overall,
maybe by 500 feet, possibly more. There was a mile 9 marker, but by this time we were back on the
full course so I just used those markers for splits. ISTR that some of the later half-mara markers
were absent as well.
We rejoined the main course on Swiss Avenue, a nice, tree-lined boulevard that heads more or less
constantly downhill for about 3 miles with a good view of the downtown skyline up ahead. I was
cruising at about my intended pace, passing a few people, getting passed. One nice thing about doing
this as a tempo run: I didn't care about my finishing place so I didn't have to worry who passed me
or anything like that. We crossed some rough street where they were doing some construction, went
back through the West End and headed in toward the finish. I stuck with my pace and watched the guys
around me sprint for the line. Over the mats in 1:37:56 chip time, a post-high school PR and
reasonably close to my goal, even allowing for the probably short course. I'll take it. (138th of
1208 men, 26th of 241 in AG; if I'd run all out and finished in, say, 1:35, I'd have been about
105th and 18th respectively.)
They gave me a nice medal and a space blanket and took my chip. I knew BG was probably not far back
so I hung around the finish to see if I could spot him, but I never did. (Turns out he finished
about 6:30 behind me, at the slow end of his informal goal range but a reasonable result for not
having trained specifically for the race.) Finally I went to get my jacket and went inside the
American Airlines Center, a fairly nice arena as arenas go, for food: Apples, bananas, oranges,
bagels, cookies, sweet rolls, pasta salad, tomato basil soup, beef chili (no thanks) and plenty of
water. They had long tables and chairs set up banquet-style and a good R&B band going.
Afterward I ended up taking care of a running bud for some time. She finished the full in just under
4 hours, with upset stomach and mild hypothermia; she wanted to wait till her BF met her in the
finish area but decided she had to get to first aid, so I accompanied her there. I made a couple of
forays out into the crowd to look for him but no luck. Finally she was back on her feet but
underdressed for the weather (her BF had her clothes and car keys), so I hung out with her; we
looked in the food arena, at her car and in the finish area for more than an hour before coming
across him -- he'd been doing the same thing and we kept missing each other. I think they're gonna
invest in a cell phone or two.
So. Good support on the course. Good traffic control on the course except for that friggin' bus in
the West End. Good course. Good bands. Good weather. Reasonably good organization. Points off for
missing mile markers for the bastard-child half-marathoners and probably short course. (I'm
confident the full 'thon course was spot on.)
Three and a half stars (woulda been four if the course had been correct and fully marked). 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
