Stockade-athon 2011 Race Recap

Today was the Stockade-athon which is a 15K (9.3 miles) in Schenectady.  I had wanted to run it last year, but I was nowhere near ready to run 9. 3 miles. So this was my first time running this race. The weather was in the 40's with some sun. It was a perfect day to run a long race.

Janis and I drove to Central Park Schenectady together and met up with a huge group of running friends. I was surprised how easy it was to find everyone with 1800 runners around. We found Elisa and Gail and Karen. Then we ran into Suzy, and Tami, and Amanda and Darlene. We even ran into Brian's cousin, Ann  - who just happened to park right next to us! Random.

Anyway - I was a little nervous about this race because I have been sick all week. I have had a stuffy nose, cough and then I lost my voice. I was a bit nervous that my breathing would be affected - so my plan was to take it easy.

The race started at 9 AM and we were off. The route was pretty. It started off in the Rose Garden of Central Park and then we weaved in and out of some neighborhoods and then headed into the Stockade neighborhood. At mile 5, we hit the big hill on State Street, which was where I walked for a little while. Then we headed back towards the park and hit another steep hill. We also ran through a graveyard which was very peaceful and flat. Then we headed back into Central Park and ran around the lake and headed toward the finish line.

The one problem that I had with this race was that there not enough water stops. Fortunately, I had my water bottle with me so I was fine. However, if I had not had it, I would have been out of luck. I think I counted 4 water stops in 9.3 miles. In my opinion, that is not nearly enough. Maybe there were more and I missed them. Anyway - the other issue I had was that my garmin told me that I ran 9.41 miles when it was only supposed to be 9.3. And everyone else that had a garmin also had the same distance. I know that the garmin can be off a bit, but this was off by over a 1/10th of a mile. I have to admit that was kind of annoying.

Anyway - my time was 1:38:41. I missed my PR by over 1 minute. That was a bit disappointing. However, considering the hills and the fact that I had a cold, I guess that's not too bad.  And - let's not forget that I ran 9.41 miles instead of 9.3. So perhaps, I would have been closer to my PR if I really did run 9.3.

It was a great race and I will plan to do it again next year.

Darlene, Suzy, Amanda, Tami, Janis and me before the race!