Race Recap: Boston Run to Remember Half Marathon

So, I haven't blogged in like a week. I just haven't had anything interesting to report. It was a boring running week since it was race week and the mileage was low. I felt like I ate way too much (there is a reason I don't buy gummy candy, because I will eat it everyday). Anyway, race recap...

We woke up at 4:15 and went through our typical race prep - coffee, oatmeal, dressed, out the door. We had to get on the train at 5:30 to get to the start. Our connection train was late, which put us getting to the start line at 6:45 for a 7:00 start. Yikes! The bathrooms were crammed into a little alley area on the side of the convention center, which created a huge bottleneck of people trying to get in and out. There were no lines, though, which was good - we were able to get back out to the start line and fight our way up to at least the 8:30 pace marker. By this point we're only a couple minutes from gun time. I start up my Garmin, and try to start up my music... but my headphones were dead. I furiously tried everything I could to get them to work to no avail - they were not going to work. I never run without music - I make dedicated playlists that I know will help keep me motivated and help me keep cadence.

The start was pretty crowded but I opted to run on the curb/sidewalk for the first 1.5 miles which helped me go faster, for sure. I was still angry about the music thing but I just let it go and resigned myself to running 13 miles with no music. The crowd finally thinned out around mile 4 and I didn't have to weave to get around people.

I kept checking my Garmin every 3 seconds and I was sort of baffled why a 7:55 pace felt so hard. My original goal was to run anything under a 1:45 - I really wanted an average pace that had a 7 as the first number. I sort of knew around the halfway point that probably wasn't going to happen. I was bored and tired of listening to myself huff and puff. Music definitely would have helped!

I decided around mile 9 to stop looking at my Garmin. I was stressing myself out and it wasn't worth it. My goal at that point became to keep running and finish as strong as I could. I was running right around a 8:00 mi/mile until then - miles 11 and 12 were at a 8:21 and 13 was 8:44. Oh well. It was pretty warm by that point and I didn't really care anymore - I was purposely going out of my way to give little kids high fives. Ha! I needed something to kill the boredom of running for that long.

Official time: 1:46:51, 8:10 avg pace 

This was less than a minute off my PR. Am I little disappointed? Maybe. But honestly, I'm okay with it.

Now to take a couple weeks of easy training! I will start marathon training in less than three weeks!

Somehow we only took one picture yesterday. Race picture fail!

And it was blurry. But at least I wasn't crying.

I bit the bullet... and ordered a Garmin.

I ordered the Garmin 405 (water resistant version) last night:

I wanted the green one, but I was considerate and ordered the black one in case my husband wants to borrow it. I told myself I'd think about it a few days. In that time frame I did a lot research, and discovered that the reviews are decidedly mixed on EVERY model of Garmin. I asked some running friends, and quite a few use this model, and like it (I will certainly be locking the bezel on runs). But this one was definitely the most wallet-friendly at $137. So I ordered one that was "Used-Like New" from Amazon, so if for some reason I don't like it or it doesn't work well for me, I can return it no problem. It also comes with a warranty. It looks as if it was just returned and repackaged, no big deal to me. I also have seen there are LOT of Garmin 305's on eBay, so if this one doesn't work, I'll probably go to that option. That one seems to get the best reviews, but that sucker is BIG and I have child-sized wrists (like 5.5" circumference). 

I decided to order mostly out of frustration. My iPhone GPS app does some great things, and I will still use it for most of my runs, but the accuracy of all the apps leaves a lot to be desired. At the Country Music Half,  my distance was off my almost a quarter mile. I have to wonder if is has to do with having a lot of people in one place trying to use the same cell signals. Neither mine or my husband's data would work at all at the finisher's village. 

Yesterday I set out for a standard run, and about a 1/2 mile from my house, I hear my robot man voice come over my earbuds to tell me I'd just run 1 mile in 3:59. Yeah, um, I wish! And then I'd had enough, and decided that I needed something that provided some consistent accuracy, along with being able to *accurately* tell me my CURRENT pace. I went out WAY too fast in my last race and didn't know until it was too late and the damage was done. I also read a lot of running blogs these days, and it seems that every fast, strong runner out there uses a Garmin. I finally admitted to myself that it was probably an important element to training to get faster. 

So it arrives in 2 days and I am like a kid in a candy store. I LOVE gadgets! I am also looking forward to using it when I visit my parents later this month - they live in a very rural area where there is no cell reception or GPS reception. 

I also want to become less dependent on running with music - I know it's not inherently safe. (Although I gotta admit, Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger" totally helped me run to the finish in Nashville) I need to understand what a certain pace 'feels' like and be able to maintain it. So I really looking forward to this new chapter in my running journey!

Do you guys use a GPS watch, and if so what brand/model? Do you love it? Do you run with music?