I had a rough
weekend, and almost didn't participate in the event.
After planes delays, loss of flight connections, too
little sleep, and waiting for an available plane for 20
hours, I almost gave up my intention to run in San
Francisco. In fact once I finally arrived in Sacramento
at 8:30pm on Saturday night , I was planning to head
directly to Chico State University, place where I am
attending a professional conference. At the very last
moment, I thought: why don't give a try and get in any
of the races programmed for the Marathon weekend? Let's
go. Who knows when I have the opportunity to go back to
the area.
Since the car
I rented had a nice navigation system, I drove to San
Francisco, carefully following the instructions given
by the female voice coming from the GPS unit. I
arrived to the city at 11:00pm, looked for the hotel and
went to bed at 12:15. I was not sure whether I would be
permitted to compete the next day since I had not picked
my bib and other goodies at the Expo. In the rush of
events, I had also missed dinner.
The Marathon and
First Half Marathon would start at 5:30am. Of course, I
didn't make it. I woke up at that time, took a quick
shower and went out to look for a bus route to take me
to downtown. The bus service starts at 6:00am on
Sundays in San Francisco and takes about 25 minutes to
arrive to "the Embarcadero", place where the race
started.
I arrived to the
place at 6:30am. I explained my weird journey to one of
the organizers and asked her whether I could switch to
the 5K race since the other participants had already
been running the course for more than one hour. In
addition, with not enough sleep and not food (not
breakfast either); I was not expecting to have a
wonderful performance anyway. She said I could do it,
but the computer would throw my official time away since
the two event worked with different chips. Not good! I
thought. Fortunately, another person came and
suggested I could run in the second half marathon that
would start from the middle point of the course around
mile 13.1. I accepted the proposition and got to a bus
that took me to that place.
Since I had
planned to run the First Half Marathon event, the one
that crossed the Golden Gate Bridge, I didn't pay any
attention to the course in the Second Half Marathon
before. How hilly was it? I had no idea! The weather
conditions were perfect, temperatures in the 60's under
a sunny sky. At 8:15am the race started, and we went
off. I ran the first three miles with the group that
had the 1:40 finishing time flag. I was running a 7:40
minutes pace per mile. Then I could not hold any longer
the pace and after stopping to get some water, I let
them go away. I really slowed down from mile 3 to mile
6! Before the mile 6 marker, I had also been passed by
the "1:50 finishing time" group. Finally, I got in a
steady pace that I kept to the end. I was waiting for
the "2:00 finishing time" group to catch me, but it
never happened. I crossed the finish line along the
waterfront, on the Embarcadero at Mission Street, in
1:55:04. I was very glad with my time! It was not very
close to a PR, but good enough after some sleep and food
deprivation and a very hilly but scenic and beautiful
course. Congratulations to the organizers for putting
together a great event.
These are my statisitics for the race
-->
|
7/30/2006 San
Francisco CA |
 |
|
San Francisco
Marathon -
Half 2nd |
|
Bib: |
19089
|
|
Name: |
Nestor Raul
Anzola |
|
Gender: |
M
|
|
Age: |
41
|
|
Hometown:
|
Hattiesburg MS
|
|
Place Overall:
|
481
|
out
of 2062
|
|
Men:
|
333
|
out
of 870
|
|
M 40-49:
|
90
|
out
of 202
|
|
AgeGrade:
|
53.38%
|
Place:
707
|
|
FINISH:
|
1:55:04
|
pace:
8:47
|
|
0: |
|
pace:
|
|
7.9 M: |
1:06:39
|
pace:
8:47 |
|
1.8 M: |
14:00
|
pace:
7:47 |
|
Chip Time:
|
1:55:04
|
|
|
Gun Time:
|
1:55:26
|
|
