Drake Relays Half Marathon

This morning I ran in the Drake Relays Half Marathon. It was cold and windy but luckily the rain held off until after the race. I got down to the Drake campus an hour early to get some good parking. While out warming up I managed to run into my wife's aunt Lisa who was doing the 5k and a friend from work who was also running the half marathon.

I ended up running extremely well. This was my 5th half marathon but it was the first time that I didn't fade late in the race. In fact I was able to finish extremely strong and record a new half marathon PR. My official time was 2:16:39 which beat my previous PR by nearly 3 minutes (set at the QC Half Marathon last September).

I really liked the finisher medals

A unique route included a lot of roads I had never run on before

All smiles post race

Of course there is a bit of bad news coming out of the race. I've been experiencing some heel and arch pain in my right foot over the past week. Although my foot held up well during the race, it was pretty sore afterwords. I'm not too concerned yet as I went through something pretty similar when I started running a few years ago. At that time I was able to use some Dr. Scholls  insoles to alleviate the issue. I picked up a pair today and my feet are already starting to feel better. Hopefully a few weeks of wearing the insoles will give my foot time to heal. 

For now, it is time to rest up, recover, and get back after it. Only 6 weeks until the marathon and 10 weeks until my first triathlon.