Tybee Island Half Marathon - Race Report

I was looking forward to a fast and flat course down on Tybee Island, what I got was a battle with the elements.

I woke up to a drizzly and balmy morning with temps in the 50′s. I went through my warm up routine and toed the start toward the front with the runners and a few other triathletes. A few of the skinny runner dudes were shivering and convulsing due to the “cold”. Me and the other triathletes we’re quite warm and comfortable.

With in 5 minutes of the start it began to downpour. So off we went into the torrential rain. The water doesn’t drain very well when your at sea level, so the course was flooded with many deep puddles. The first few miles I had the wind at my back, then we would make a turn and I would get blasted in the face with a big gust. Between the wind and charging though the puddles my HR was all over the place, but I was feeling strong and for the most part the conditions weren’t getting to me mentally.

About mile 7 I had a guy right on my heels as we ran down the main drag that runs through the island into a strong wind. I moved a bit left and so did he, I moved right and so did he. He clipped the back of my shoe once and I had enough! I’m certainly not giving anyone a free ride out of the wind on this day. I didn’t have the breath to say anything so I just decided it was a sign to make my move and shift it to another gear. It took about a half mile but I finally dropped him and held steady 5-7 beats under my LT for the next 3 miles and it felt oddly comfortable.

I hit 3 miles to go and had 4 guys strung out 400m ahead of me. I let it rip and ran the rest at LT, passing all of them by the end. This was probably the hardest I’ve ever pushed myself at the end of a race, but for some reason I was just really able to embrace it this time. The course measured .15 miles long according to Garmin and I confirmed it when I mapped it out online. My time according to when I hit 13.1 on the Garmin was a PR by 15 seconds. More importantly I was happy with the way I handled the conditions and attacked with no fear at the end. Can’t wait to stick a swim and bike in front of an finish like that!