The Dallas Rock N Roll Half Marathon was yesterday and His Nibs and myself ran that in lieu of a long run. With 9536 of our best friends. Cold to start so I kept the Sockwas on for three miles and carried them the rest of the way. The course was interesting and fun, more so than the Dallas Marathon, I think, with more views, elevation changes, and lots of great crowd support. I passed one barefoot young man about mile 9, but I was in a hurry and after we acknowledged each other's superior choice in footware, I sped off and never saw him again. So if tall, young curly-haired guy is reading this, who was passed by short, old white ponytail, please give a shout out! The last mile or so was over the Houston Street Bridge and that's the worst surface I've ever run on, worse than the Trinity Levee gravel. It was like the coarsest, sharpest sandpaper. I tried to stay on the painted stripe at the side but too many other people on it, so then I moved over to the DART rail line on the other side and that was a little better. I was so glad to see that bridge end. I ended with a time of 2:22. I'd been shooting for 2:15 but have battled a head cold for about ten days, crappy wet weather and a bit of burnout from a couple of high mileage months. My time was still decent for me. I was 27th out of my age/gender group of 89 and most of them were younger than me. Can you tell I'm trying to make this sound good? Now for the next mountain to climb, the OKC Memorial Marathon in five weeks.
