Race Recap: Sturgis Falls Half Marathon

Sturgis Falls Half Marathon, 6/27/21 Cedar Falls, IA

Distance: 13.23 miles (a bit long)

Terrain: Paved recreation trails and roads

Weather: 70s and sunny

Here we go again with the Sturgis Falls Half Marathon. This is a race that I do every single year that I'm in town. This year, I was in town. No excuses. It's a cheap local race and I have nothing better to do. Plus this year my mom was able to come to town and babysit, so my husband Eric could also run. Huzzah!

Pre-race selfie, repping Spartan Ohio

I drove to the Rec and parked at 6:50 AM for the 7 AM start. Plenty of time to use a port-a-potty with no lines and get to the start line. We started off on the new course, which was great. In the first few miles we did the out and back on Grand Boulevard that usually comes between miles 8-11. It was nice to 1) get the biggest hill on the course out of the way early, and 2) not have to do that out and back while exhausted and boiling hot. Water stops had blue Gatorade (inconsistently mixed, but that's okay) and cold water. Came back down Grand and took a right at Pfeiffer park to go out and back on the South Riverside Trail, which is usually at the beginning of the race. I loved that it was a shorter version of the usual out and back, and that we got to do the bulk of the race (miles 4-9) in a very shady area.

With all the out and backs, I did get to see Eric crushing this race in two locations. He claimed he'd be very slow, but on this Riverside out and back I told him he could get an age group award. Another fun thing about out and backs, though, is seeing the leaders. And on this occasion, I saw the race leader flying by (he was at mile 9 when I was almost at mile 4). And then nothing. Nobody. For at least five minutes. Holy crap. Checked later and he won the race by TEN MINUTES. That is unheard of, y'all. I've never seen anyone just totally smoke the entire rest of the field like that. It wasn't a 100-mile ultra, it was a HALF MARATHON. You generally don't see leads of over a couple minutes.

Anyway, my race was also going fairly well, relatively speaking. I felt energized and was able to jog a good amount. I started doing an interval where I'd jog 45 seconds every quarter mile. It worked very well heading out and back. Got back to Krieg's Crossing (a huge pedestrian bridge) at mile 9, and at the end of the bridge there was a group of women mountain biking who it turns out were clients of mine from my OCR class! It was a great boost to have a random cheering section in the middle of nowhere! Especially since I was very spaced out from other runners and near the back of the pack. I'd passed a couple of people, but now there was nobody around.

Took the North Riverside Trail west towards downtown. When I came out into the sunnier areas, I started to feel pretty tired. It wasn't super hot (maybe mid-70s) but it still sapped my energy. The course also wasn't extremely well marked but fortunately I knew exactly where to go. Made the turns I needed to and eventually ran through Washington Park, where I caught and passed one last person. Dug deep to maintain my now-slower pace and finished near the Rec in 2:57, which was faster than my goal of three hours! Turns out Eric ran in 1:37 and did get an age group award. Good day for the household!

Pros:

-Love the new course. It takes us past downtown for the first time in many years. 

-Gatorade and COLD water at every water stop is a nice touch.

-Several flavors of donut holes at the finish line.

Cons: 

-Could've used another water stop between miles 9 and 11.5. They should have set one up downtown instead of having two at Washington Park.

-Course not well marked between Krieg's Crossing (mile 9) and the finish. People who don't understand "just go straight until told otherwise" might have trouble.

Race Grade: A-. Probably the best Sturgis half marathon on record!