Cleveland Half Marathon 2009: James' Report

Photo courtesy: Thomas Ondrey/The Plain Dealer

This year, the race began at 7:00 am, which was earlier than previous years. This difference in time is enough to make the most stalwart bleary-eyed.

I stayed in Tremont with my old high school friend Umakant this year. Wendy and her boyfriend were kind enough to stop by and pick me up on their way into the city for the race. We parked a few blocks away near Jacob's (now Progressive) Field. The walk and wait at the race line was very chilly and I was glad I had thought to don a garbage bag that morning. The temperature reading outside of the Huntington Bank building read 51 degrees Fahrenheit though the wind off of Lake Erie made it feel much colder.

The race started on time and for some bizarre reason the entire race column walked to the start line before starting to run. I have never seen that before and was confused as to why everyone wanted to walk if they were going to be running 6, 13.1 or 26.2 miles that day?

Wendy and I kept each other company and took our running tour of downtown and the West side together. It was a very quiet race with no especially loud runners or loud spectators; classic Cleveland it felt like. Very charming and quiet and professional it seemed. The elevation was not ever too drastic it felt like except for the last few miles where there was a noticeable drop as we returned to the downtown area and enjoyed the extra downhill speed.

I broke off from Wendy at the end and I felt strong. At the Half and Full split, I felt strong. The pasta and two-week training period had made this run into something of a planned long run and I felt like I could do at least a few more. The crowd was excited and I felt pumped, but I ended up veering right and finishing the race strong, passing the majority of people rocking out at about a 7:45 pace the last mile.

My race results are below:

8376 James Tsai Baltimore MD 29 02:07:40 02:11:55 9:44.2 1:00:50

My two week training program: (Disclaimer: I don't recommend this to everyone, but as I promised in a previous post, I wanted to document my short period of training to get ready for the half)

Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
3 miles to start to get back into shape at Race pace (10 min/mi)	5 miles with running club at slightly faster Race Pace (9.5 min/mi)		Ultimate Frisbee game (heavy cardio exercise ~90 minutes)		5 miles at slightly faster Race Pace (9.5 min/mi)
10 miles at Race pace (10 min/mi)	5 miles with running club at slightly faster Race Pace (9 min/mi)			3 miles to keep limber (time intervals between 8 and 10)
RACE DAY

My carb-loading: I had a pasta dinner the Wednesday night before; just linguine and some chicken. Friday I had spaghetti and meatballs and then the night before I had a big bowl of Pho. I will do a future article on carb-loading.