You had two options to pick up your bib: Friday afternoon or Saturday morning before the race. Since Fontana is pretty far from where I live I opted for the Saturday morning pick up which meant an early night and an even earlier wake up call. I got to Fontana around 5ish since they were adamant that no bibs would be handed out after 6am. I picked up my stuff and headed to the bus line where runners were taken 13.1 miles up to the Applewhite Campground. Now here is my first piece of advice: Bring something to keep warm, because it is cold up at the start. I was wearing a pretty thick hoodie and was still shivering. I suggest a throw away outfit or if you don't have throw aways, there is a truck at the start line that will take your drop bags to the finish line.
I was at the start about an hour before the race started. I met some nice people including a woman (forgive me, I totally forgot to ask her for her name) who was running her 45th half marathon. She is turning 50 in December and her goal was to run 50 half marathons and 10 full marathons by her 50th birthday. She is an inspiration let me tell you...and looks nothing close to 50. I also met another woman (again, didn't get her name..I'm awful) who was super nice and had a great energy to her. She was doing a running streak where she has been running at least one mile everyday; I forgot how many days she had been doing this, but I also felt inspired by her. She was aiming for a sub 1:30 in this race.
The race started promptly at 7:30am and was very informal, which is kind of nice I have to say. There was no loud music, or an announcer to cheer for you as you passed the start. There was no one to sing the national anthem. I knew the race had started because all of sudden the crowd just started to move. Here is my second piece of advice: Don't get carried away with the downhill. Now that being said, do as a say and not as I do. I was well aware of the downhill course. I talked to others who have run this race and was told the same thing...but did I listen? Of course not. I sped through the first few miles and just took advantage of the downhill, but man did that creep up on me later; somewhere between mile 6 and 7. My quads were tight and I was tired. From then on, it was a mind game, I told myself, just get to mile 10 then you only have three more miles, but then when I got to mile 10, I was like, "S#!* I still have 3 miles." My legs were shot, I was exhausted and I slowed down significantly. Mile 10 and 11 were a struggle, but once I hit mile 12, I knew it was almost over. When the finish line was in sight, I picked up the pace and ran as hard as my tired legs would let me. I was so thankful to the crowd of supporters and spectators who were motivating and cheering me on. I crossed the finish line and as all runners do, I immediately stopped my Garmin which read 1:50:21. Not bad. I was hoping to get under 1:50, but was still very proud of myself.
All in all, I really enjoyed this race and plan to come back and run it smarter. I think if I would have just kept an easy relaxed pace at the beginning, I would have finished much stronger and maybe even with a better time. As you can see, my splits were all over the place.
Mile 1- 8:23 Mile 5- 8:14 Mile 9- 8:17 Mile 13- 8:57
Mile 2- 7:47 Mile 6- 8:15 Mile 10- 8:21
Mile 3- 7:51 Mile 7- 8:21 Mile 11- 8:52
Mile 4- 8:00 Mile 8- 8:15 Mile 12- 9:20 (Ouch)
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