Parked at the Canada Post parking lot and donated the $10.00 parking fee to Sick Children's Hospital. I had a slow warm-up run to the race site, which took 15 minutes, covering a distance of 1.76 K.
Arrived to the starting line with a few minutes to go before the 5:30 PM start. The weather was cloudy. There was forecast for thundershowers this afternoon, which never occurred :-) It was 22C (but 29C with humidity). I like the 1 hour earlier start for the 30 K so most of the race is not in the dark.
My goal was to keep under 6 min/K throughout the race. The race started on Buchette Street and on time this year, heading west on Commissioners Street and then a bit north to Villers Street. I didn't like this view as railroad tracks separated our run east and then west before making it back to Commissioners Street. Then it was east all the way to Leslie Street and then south to Tommy Thompson Park (with a run on Unwin Street). This took about 5 K. Tommy Thompson Park was from 6 K until about 17 K. The payment included running on rocks! We headed south to the lighthouse and then back north to the entrance of the park. Nice view of the city! This is a different route than the 15 K, as I recall running through a bridge. Once outside the park, we headed north until Lake Shore Blvd and then into Ashbridge's Bay Park (which had some steep hills to climb); I recall "accidently" running in this park during training a couple of months ago and it's scenic. Again, the hills were tough as the race was 2/3 completed. There were also numerous twists and turns here. Running on Woodbine Beach wasn't easy since it was running on the wooden and often sandy boardwalk. Lots of people on the boardwalk either running, sitting, or playing beach volleyball; it was tricky since we had to share the route with them. Once we reached the Balmy Beach Canoe Club, we headed back west to Leslie Street -- which I was pleased since it was back to running on pavement. Once we reached Commissioners Street, we shared the race with the 15 Ks.
I reached the finish line at 3:01:21.5 (gun) and 3:00:17.2 (chip). I just checked my previous 30 K run result from the Around the Bay 30 K and I improved my time by 14 minutes :-) I placed #464 out of 771; gender placed 292 out of 386 and in my age group placed 91 out of 108. There was a time mat at the half marathon distance and I came in with a time of 2:03:38 (chip) -- which is fast for me.
It was different to run on so many types of road surfaces -- pavement, rocks, wood; I'm glad it didn't rain as that would have made it very challenging.
The race was organized with lots of volunteers on the route and at the fluid stations. There was one confusion when a volunteer said "Gatorade" but gave me water. The police were stationed at the major intersections.
The finish line was not crowded (probably since the race is a smaller race). Chip removal was quick. A volunteer put a finisher's medal over my neck. Another volunteer was distributing free stainless steel water bottles -- that's a different freebie :-)
The race reminded me to respect the distance of a full marathon! It wasn't easy to run 30 K at race pace. One concern that continues is my left leg Quad. It ached quite a bit at about half way point of the race and continued. Walking back to the car took a long time since I could not walk fast. I'll continue to monitor it tomorrow - maybe use the "Stick" to massage it? I've never had Quad issues before. Previously, the issue was Runner's Knee on the left leg -- but that's not an issue anymore. Aargh! The left leg...
