Fun in the Sun and in the snow too!!

[Ken B]

This report is of two events. The Fort Lauderdale, Florida A1A Half-Marathon and the Waterloo, Ontario Refridgee-Eighter 8 Miler.
A1A - Fort Lauderdale Florida
I originally signed up for this race back in the summer of 2014. It was to be the striking off event for the RunForFun Cruise. Out friends Steve and Mary from Ohio were also booked for the cruise. However, the costs of the cruise and related events were rising and we decided to not do the cruise. As I could not get a refund for the race entry, in December I started looking for an inexpensive package that would fit in our travel budget and still get me to run the race and for Mrs. Tortoise and I to visit with our friends for a short time. I was successful in getting a 5 night, six day package with flight, rental car, and hotel at a reasonable price.
Pre-Race:
We flew down on Thursday, February 12 and checked into an Extended Stays of America in Tamarac, Florida - about 15 miles from the race location. It worked out fine as it was in an industrial area and I had lots of places to get in training runs. On the Friday, we went to the Expo and picked up my race packet. We didn't check out the Expo as we planned on doing that with Steve and Mary on Saturday. On Saturday, we met Steve and Mary near the finish line and their hotel. We had lunch and then we drove them to the Expo. They picked up their packets and we shopped a bit at the Expo. I bought a fuel belt with the bottles at the front and it is also a bib holder. Mary purchased a pair of shoes and we dropped the two of them off at their hotel.
Race-Day:
We were awake by 3:15 and left for the finish area by 4 AM. It took 30 minutes to get there and get a good parking spot. We walked over to the shuttle bus location and hooked up with Steve and Mary. The three of us took the second last shuttle bus ( the organizers under estimated the number of buses needed. ) Mrs. Tortoise returned to the car to nap while she waited for me to finish. The bus arrived at the start line about 2 minutes before the start. I managed to weave my way through the crowd to get about half way among the racers.
After a five minute shuffle to the starting mat, we were away. Because of this situation, I spent the first several km weaving through walkers and runners. My target time was 1:55 , which was my time at Baton Rouge in January. I thought at this time that I should adjust that to maybe 2 hours. In retrospect, I think it was helpful. Certainly my focus for the first half of the race was getting around slower runners. The course is very flat with just one overpass to run up and over. After the race, I was surprised to see my 10K time was 50:19 which is less than a minute over my PB for that distance.
At about the 6 km mark we turned onto A1A which runs along Fort Lauderdale Beach. Other than about 3 km where we did a loop though a local park, the remainder of the route was on A1A. I took one walk break at about 12K to take a gel and a drink of Gatorade. I felt pretty good up until 17 km when my legs started getting tired and I had to push a bit to maintain pace. Overall this is a great course and I plan to come back and run the marathon in the future. ( Even more of running the A1A ). We were able to connect with Mary after the race but she and Steve had to leave as soon as he finished to get to the cruise ship.
Gun time was 1:55:17 and chip time was 1:50:03. This was good for second place in my age group. ( the winner's chip time was 1:36:44 ) I also placed 698/4240 overall. My fasted km split was 5:04 and the slowest 5:43 ( my walk break )
I definitely will return and run the marathon. I was lucky this year with great running conditions: Temperature range 9 to 11 Celsius along with a flat, scenic route.

Refridgee-Eighter 8 Miler - Waterloo
What a difference a week makes. It was minus 13 Celsius when I arrived at Rim Park in Waterloo this morning. My friend Mike, with whom I was supposed run this event was ill so I was on my own. I arrived early as Mrs. Tortoise needed the car to get to the Waterloo RR to meet her walker friends by 8:20. I hung around inside the Rim Park Centre and chatted with friends until 9:30 and then went outside to warm up before lining up for the 10 AM start. This is a fairly tough course with a couple of steep hills and two sections of a long, steady incline. Most of the time , we could run on wet pavement but there were several sections of slushy snow which were a bit slick. My target time for Mike was 1:15 and I decided to try for that solo as well. The race was pretty uneventful. I was fairly comfortable throughout. I took two walk breaks, both on the steep uphill ( one hill - but traversed twice as we ran a loop in the middle of the route. ) My chip time was 1:09:47 which was good for first place in my age group. Of course, I was the only 70 plus runner in the event!!!

So ends the sun to snow adventure!

[Spirit Unleashed]

Wow, your A1A time is FAST!

[Habs4ever]

You are getting faster with age! You continue to impress and inspire.

[Robinandamelia]

Another great couple of results Ken!!!

[5km]

Way to go Ken. Congrats on the AG placements.

Keep up the good work representing us "young guys!"

[HCcD]

Running along the coastline in South Beach towards the finish line is quite awesome, eh !!!

Think we had similar conditions last year for the start time .. but, once the sun popped out after 9am or so .. those running a 4+ hour marathon really got hot, if I recall ??

Congratulations, again ...

eta: Early Bird Registration for 2016 ends midnight on February 24, 2015 ...

eta: If you are interested in making a cruise out of it .. the Fun to Run Cruise is planning another cruise run next year .. Race the 1/2 Marathon or Full in the morning, then bus it to Miami Beach and hop on the Norwegian Cruise Ship for a week ...

[barebuns1]

Congrats on your 2 events. Great race reports.