Churchill’s half marathon 2021

Churchill’s is the oldest race in Ohio (54 continuous years!), and it’s also one of the only point to point races in our area.  We start at a high school in Perrysburg, and end at a mall in Maumee.  The race course goes through neighborhoods but also along the Maumee River on both sides, which is hilly!  Some may not think it’s “hilly”, but it really is – as far as our flat area of Ohio goes!

Since this is a point to point race, we needed to ride a bus to get to the start. Luckily this race is super close to our house so we got on the bus at 7:45am. That’s not even early when it comes to races! Per race rules, we wore masks on the bus.

Even though this race is known for cold and sometimes windy days, it does have the use of a high school as the staging area before the race.  A pep band is playing and waking up the crowds of runners, we get to talk to friends before the race, and the restrooms are nice and clean!  Here’s our local chapter of She Runs This Town.  A great group of friends that I’ve had the pleasure of knowing and running with for years now.  I didn’t realize until after I posted this picture on Facebook that a guy was in our picture.  LOL!  It was someone’s husband.

This was the first half marathon for my daughter. Prior to this she had only run an 8K when she was much younger, and more recently has been on the high school cross country team (varsity all four years.  Go her!)  As we lined up in the race corrals, we (myself, my husband, and Sydney) all wished each other well and went our separate ways.  We were all content just doing our own thing, and Sydney wasn’t interested in having anyone running with her. We did put an inspirational sign on the course for her.

When the gun went off, I knew right away that I had picked my race outfit poorly!  I love my tights.  I really love my water belt. But, the two together were not a good combination.  The material of the tights made the belt slip and I fought with the belt about every 2 minutes to keep it down.  Ugh.  Add to that a shirt that I decided to put on last minute was sneaking up inside my quarter zip.  Sure, I really should have stopped to tuck it in, but you know, it would have wasted valuable seconds 😉

We lucked out with the weather. It didn’t feel too bad (weather apps said 36 degrees, feels like 28) and the wind wasn’t a major factor.  I even took off my gloves after a bit and unzipped my shirt.  The wind was at our backs for the last few miles.  The sun even peeked out for 2 seconds.

Miles 1 – 6: 8:31, 8:35, 8:31, 8:26, 8:29, 8:32.   I wasn’t really watching my pace, just running by feel.  It felt pretty good!

By the time mile 8 rolled along, we had gone over two smaller hills and my pace was dropping.  I was feeling tired.  Miles 7-8: 8:45, 8:58.  Right about that time Sydney and Alan come cruising past me!  This was funny because my daughter was convinced that I was going to finish first.  When she heard I ran a 1:50 in Columbus half the prior month, she told me she had not been training as much as I did so she would be slower.  And yet there she was, just cruising past me!  I knew she would.  But the surprising part was to see my husband who was coming back from an injury.  He had to pass on marathons scheduled in Oct and Nov, and there he was tailing Sydney!  (I would say she was slightly displeased by seeing all of her family members running with her at this point.  haha!). Here’s shot of me on the bridge, crossing the Maumee River. Deep in thought apparently!

My family went on their way and I kept chugging along.  And now it was time for the real hills!  Even though I had spent the last few weeks running on this area of the course in preparation, I was still getting spanked by those hills.  Oof.  Miles 9-12: 8:55, 8:59, 8:57, 8:53. This is my daughter crossing the bridge with my husband trailing her.

There was one final hill to go up, and then an overpass.  Runfession:  I made it to the top of that hill, past the photographer, then I walked!  I gave myself 10 seconds to regroup, and then kept going.  Mile 13: 9:35.  I was thinking “Just try not to look exhausted going up the hill!”

Sydney looked strong going up that hill!

I only managed to get an 8:58 for the finish chute, but I did finish in 1:56.  Not too bad!!  Not my fastest, not my slowest.  This will never be a PR race for me, and after taking time off this summer with a sports hernia I am happy just to be able to run two half marathons!

My daughter and husband finished in 1:52.  Sydney took off like lightning at the end with a sub 7:00 min mile in the finish chute (which left my husband in the dust).  Big smiles all around!!

After the race we headed to the party tent to listen to the band, refuel and share war stories with our friends.  A local brewery brought in some beer and we enjoyed a few drinks. It was a good time!

One of the ladies in our running group made hats for us. We also call members of our SRTT group “Babes”, and here is me modeling it. There may have been a few cups of beer involved. 🙂

The funniest thing happened at the race.  I think I wrote about a runner from the training group that had approached me in the spring during a group run and complimented me on my strong effort and consistent pacing at a marathon tune up race.  I became friends with this guy on Strava and I’m pretty sure he has an alert set for every time I upload a workout because he is almost always the first one to give me Kudos.  Well, I saw him after this race.  We chatted.  He asked how I had done on the race and I mentioned that the race was good.  I finished in 1:56.  Then he said “What??  I thought for sure you were going to get a sub 1:50!!  I see your runs on Strava and you always are faster!”    Uh, what?  What the heck?  Nothing like having people judge your efforts!  It was all lighthearted though, and I told him I was sorry I didn’t live up to his expectations.  Bahaha!!!  But seriously, who says things like that? 😂

Race stats: Finish time 1:56:19, 4th in age group out of 37, overall 306 out of 699.