Miles to go …

I ran San Francisco Half Marathon 2009 yesterday and here are the results:

I’m excited about the results because improved my timing by almost 3 minutes. And running on Golden Gate Bridge is always a great experience. As always, the race was very well organized starting from expo to bib/tee-shirt distribution, well marked course, water and medical stations, local community support, buses from half marathon finish line to start line and every thing else. A few possible improvements are listed below.

I saw Dean Karnazes (50/50/50 marathon man) and met Bart Yasso (Yasso 800 man) in the Expo. There is certainly a wealth of knowledge to pick up from these elite runners.

The overall results are as shown:

Click on the image above for complete results.

Couple of sugested improvements to the San Francisco Marathon organizing committee for the next year …

1. Really, really, really qualify runners in Wave 1. Ask them for a qualifying time from a previous race or something. Walkers and 10-minute milers are NOT Wave 1.
2. Separate the course going on/off the Golden Gate Bridge, not just with orange cones, but with an additional rope. Otherwise slower runners spill over on the other side and almost bumping into the faster runners.
3. The expo hall had a wonderful set of exhibitors but it became really crowded as the day progressed. Either an alternate location or back to Market/Embaracdero next year is a better option.

BTW I already registered for the Half Marathon 2010 and got a nice bib#: 1111. The online registration for 2010 San Francisco Marathon is open until Aug 7th. See you there next year!

Here are my two personal goals for the next few months:

1. Run a half-marathon with 7ish pace
2. Qualify for Boston – probably next year

11 major marathon mistakes says that “marathon pace will be about … 16 seconds more lethargic per mile than half-marathon clocking“. If that is accurate and will hold true for me, then both of my above goals are well meshed with each other

And many thanks to my family for bearing with my weekday early morning runs and long runs over the weekend!

I’ve run 95 hours and 26 minutes, a total 758.93 miles and 166 out of 208 days so far in 2009. Here is a quick chart that shows my running mileage so far:

This chart is generated using an application that I’ve built over the past few days. Tomorrow, I’ll share that entire application on this blog, stay tuned!

Miles to go …

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I completed Kaiser Permanente 1/2 marathon earlier today and the statistics are:

I’m a happy runner to beat my best time of 8:04 in Silicon Valley 2008.

The top-5 finishers are:

I thoroughly enjoyed the very well organized race. There were close to 9000 runners (the biggest so far in race’s history of 26 years) with over 6000 1/2 marathon runners (record number as well). The parking lots were packed and so it took a while to find an empty spot. But after that every thing was seamless – boarding the shuttles, pre-race warm up, mile markers, post-race celebration, flexibility screening, and every thing else. And the weather certainly cooperated a lot with beautiful sun shining early in the race. I was certainly over dressed so had to lug my jacket/gloves with me. Loved the fact that somebody was announcing the minutes past since guntime at each mile marker – very personal and useful in my opinion!

Here are couple of possible improvements:

• Pace groups were very poorly planned. Even though there were markers for 5, 6 ad 7 min pace at start line but there certainly were some 10 minuters over there. It easily took a mile to filter through them. I like the way waves are planned in runsfm.com.
• No race medal I don’t mind getting charged a few extra dollars but give me a race medal, c’mon please!

I’d love to run this race again next year!

And finally here are some pictures:

And you can certainly watch tweets at twitter.com/arungupta for more pictures.

Here are my timings so far:

It seems running 31 days (out of 32 so far) in 2009 is helping

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I’ll be running Kaiser Permanente San Francisco 1/2 marathon tomorrow. This is my first time on this course:

Click on the above map to explore!

The course seems slightly confusing because it crosses itself couple of times. But hopefully it’s managed nicely to help the runners. The bib and the chip came in via postal mail which saves an additional trip to San Francisco for material pickup, that is nice!

The starting time of 8am, predicted low of 46^o F, 30 days of running this month, and running right next to the ocean – will find out if it’s an exciting adventure tomorrow

Anybody else running ?

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I completed Silicon Valley Half Marathon yesterday. Although I missed my target of 8 min/mile by 4 seconds but still improved my personal best by 3 min and 8 secs. Here are my official results:
 

A summary of half-marathoners:

And the top 5 finishers:

And then the complete results.

Even though the number of 1/2 marathoners were much smaller (957 instead of 6679) than my previous marathon but I still enjoyed the run. Going through familiar streets and neighborhood was the best part

Here is a short video at the start:

And another one at the finish line in Los Gatos High School:

No marathon can ever be completed without family support. All the practice takes a significant amount of time away from family. And it’s certainly exciting when they accompany you, early in the morning, for the actual race. Many thanks to my family for helping in my marathons all through out these years Here are couple of pictures:

The massage at the end of the race by National Holistic Institute was certainly relaxing!

And of course a small photo album:

Here are my timings so far:

As you can see, they have improved over past years It only becomes interesting going forward because of the higher bar.

Any suggestions on good San Francisco Bay Area marathons ?

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Some more pictures (taken by marathonfoto) from my recently concluded San Francisco 1/2 Marathon …

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Even though it took me 4 minutes extra from 2005 Half Marathon but I’m happy with the results knowing the amount of practice put in. The complete results are available here.

It was really exciting to be running with 19,000+ runners. The spectators, volunteers, staff, cops and everybody else were excellent. It is definitely fun to run this course with the amount of energy and planning, most likely will run again next year as well. Here is a video shot of marathon start:

Even though I ran a half-marathon but my 5-year old and wife did their own by waking up 3am in the morning, driving me around and then picking me from the finish line. Check out some pictures at:

Now that’s a total tally of 2 half & 2 full marathons for me:

• San Francisco Full Marathon 2007
• Silicon Valley Full Marathon 2006
• San Francisco Half Marathon 2005

Next one is Silicon Valley Half Marathon on Oct 26, 2008. And if you are a Sun employee and running Silicon Valley, we do have a corporate team and even a 10% discount on registration (even backdated . Send me an email and I’ll get you connected.

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Exactly 1 month later (Aug 3, 2008), I’ll be running the San Francisco Marathon (First Half) – the coolest marathon right in the middle of Summer. Register Now! Read the 2nd newlsetter for all the latest developments.

 Here are some of the features that make this marathon cool:

• Music Miles – Local bands, cheerleaders and motivational signs and trivia through out the course
• Best Running City in America – Voted by Runner’s World
• Spectator Bus Service for friends and family to cheer up
• Run through historic landmarks – Golden Gate Bridge, Fisherman’s Wharf, Presidio, Home of San Francisco Giants, Bay Bridge
• Going Green – Reducing the impact on environment

Watch the entire course of full marathon in the video footage that follows a group of runners, led by Dean Karnazes (the ultra marathon man).

Part 1 at …

And then part 2 (starting @ mile 10) …

This will be the 4th addition to my list of marathons:

• San Francisco 2007
• Silicon Valley 2006
• San Francisco 2005 (1/2)

I completed PG&E @ Rancho last weekend in 84 mins, 45 secs (run+walk 56 mins to the top starting from the first parking lot and downhill running) and hope to run 4 more times in as many weekends before the race.

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