Brooklyn Half Marathon

And the good races continue!  1:22:32 (6:18/mile).  The day began at 3:30 a.m.  By 4:30 a.m., I was on the train.  At 5:40 a.m., I was stepped off the train at the Brooklyn Museum.  I hung out with a few friends in the parking lot of the museum.  Then, I dropped off my bag at 6:15 and did a 1/2-mile warm up.    I was in my corral by 6:30.

Fellow West Side Y'ers Farbod and Lou joined me in the corral.  I felt uncomfortable for the first couple of miles.  I wasn't warmed up properly and despite the slow pace, I felt awkward and the pace felt difficult.  Both Lou and Farbod mentioned that they were not going to pass me, or at least for the first few miles.  It was nice running with people I knew.  

We entered the park in the middle of Mile 4.  By that time, I finally felt like I was warmed up.  The hills in the park weren't too bad, but I was still anxious to get out of the park.  When I got out of the park (after Mile 7) I felt like I was in a groove and ready to take on Ocean Parkway.  

By Mile 8, Lou had pulled away from me a bit.  When I hit Mile 9, I remember thinking I haven't gone on any 10 mile runs lately.  At Mile 10, I thought I was on 1:23 pace but I wasn't sure.  Once I hit Mile 11, I knew I could keep up the pace.  For the most part, I was slowly passing people for all of Ocean Parkway.  When I got onto the boardwalk and approached the finish, I thought I could see the clock showing 1:22 something.  I was excited about the prospect of breaking 1:23:08 (my fastest time for the half since I became a masters runner), so I started running pretty hard.  It wasn't until a couple seconds after I crossed the line and I stopped my watch that I realized I broke 1:23 by a large margin.  

My splits:

1. 6:41

2. 6:35

3. 6:21 (estimated)

4. 6:07 (estimated)

5. 6:25

6. 6:24

7. 6:10

8. 6:13

9. 6:09

10. 6:12

11. 6:16

12. 6:14

13. 6:07

13.1  0:38

My 5K splits:

5K  20:10

10K  19:45

15K  19:12

20K  19:20