Since my cousin’s wedding in October meant I couldn’t attend the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Race event (I’ve done the half marathon for the last two years), I decided I’d try to find another half marathon to do before 2016 ended. I like the idea of doing two half marathons a year because it forces me to keep in consistent racing shape. I may not always be at my fastest racing pace, but if I space half marathons out by six months or so, it forces me to be consistently training for something.

While I would’ve preferred to race in another country (although I did do my other half in Iceland this year!), the only semi-convenient one was the Niagara Falls International Marathon event (there’s the full, a half, a 10k and a 5k). Niagara Falls is about a 90 minute drive from Toronto so I could easily rent a car, get a hotel overnight and do the race in the morning. Not to mention the medals are STUNNING! (Seriously, that medal was a huge incentive.)

So that’s what we did. My husband and I headed down to Niagara Falls on Saturday the 29th and stayed overnight. The half marathon portion of the event started at 10 am, so it was a rather peaceful morning since it’s not like I had to be up before the crack of dawn to get some fuel in my system.

Unfortunately, it was relaxing until, rather abruptly, it wasn’t. As we were headed out to the race start zone (about 20 kilometers away from where we were staying) we discovered that Google maps had instructed us to get on the highway at an exit that was closed (and had been closed for several months!). I was like okay, whatever, take the side roads to get there. Then Google Maps dumped us onto the Niagara Parkway, which was, of course, closed for the race. We came screeching up to an entrance to the Niagara Parkway and some guy was like “I can’t let you on this street since the race starts in five minutes!”. At this point, we were still 10 kilometers away from the start zone! He told us to go back to the highway, get on the next exit (pray it was open), go two stops and then figure it out from there. I was legit panicking at this point because it was 9:55 am and the race started at 10! So we did as we were told, all while trying to calculate the best route on Google maps. We came roaring up to the start zone for the race at 10:05 am. And it was EMPTY, all the runners had taken off five minutes ago! I jumped out of the car, threw my sweatshirt at my husband, and bolted for the starting track mat. So I ran TO the start zone, looped around it so my bib tracker would start recording my run, and then started out on the run by my lonesome self.

To be fair, there were some spectators still left at the start zone who were cheering for me to start the race (haha), so that was kind of cute. But my god my nerves were at all time high stress level. In hindsight, I don’t really know why – it’s not like they ever really close down the start area of the race, and it wasn’t a loopback course, so it’s not like they needed to convert the start zone to an end zone.

So off I started, with very few people in sight. This was a smaller race (only 1715 people ran it), so it was at least fairly spacious on the Niagara Parkway and I didn’t have to dodge too many people. Of course, since I started five minutes behind people, I was behind even the walkers, which meant I was constantly passing and moving around people because I wasn’t in a group of people who would be going my pace. It also meant I had a lot of ground to cover to even get to the very edge of the group of people who would finish in under two hours and ten minutes (and in the end, I still never caught them – that guy in yellow that’s in a lot of my shots finished around the 2:13 mark, but I came in under 2:10).

So how was it? Honestly, one of the best courses ever! It was either flat or downhill, with only the smallest of hills to cross a very, very tiny bridge towards the end of the race. I was never out of breath and the scenery was beautiful. It was a bit bracing at the very start of the race though because I could see the Skylon Tower in the very far distance (which is roughly where the race ends) and I was like “oh my godddddddddd that is SO FREAKING FAR AWAY”. But whatever, I know I can run the 21.1 kilometers in a half marathon, it was just about buckling down and getting it done.

At the start of the race the weather was beautiful – around 11C degrees and I honestly thought I’d worn too much clothing. But about halfway through the race the weather changed dramatically. All of a sudden it dropped to about 6 degrees and it started raining. It was pretty freaking miserable – I lost feeling in my hands and could barely hold the water bottle they gave us at the finish zone. It’s almost a week later now that I’m writing this blog post and I’m still dealing with the terrible chaffing I got from this run. Ugh. (Under my chest, on my torso, and oddly, on my lower back which I can only assume was from the back pocket on my shorts.) Despite the cold, I didn’t get any kind of knee lockup (which I’m prone to on very long runs) and my feet didn’t go horribly numb (which is an annoying problem with my current shoes)!

In the end, I finished the half in 2:08:52, which is about 90 seconds slower than my fastest. Given this is a half marathon distance, I’m 100% okay with that speed because I was really only running once or twice a week to train for this. That really isn’t enough time per week to train for a half, but based on my previous experiences, I knew it was possible for me to complete it with so little training.

Just a few details about the course that I think others would be interested to know:

• There is no race kit pickup on the day of the race, even for out-of-towners. You MUST get it the day before at the expo.
• There are no gels provided on the course – so bring your own. (I picked one up the day before the race as the expo as I was picking up my race kit.)
• There are power bars to eat on the course, but the last thing I want to be doing while running/racing is chewing on something like that!
• All of the volunteers are SUPER friendly and helpful – I tried to thank them when I was getting water at the stations because they all just seemed so lovely!
• Water/gatorade stations and porta-potties are frequent, but you’ll find there’s often a lineup for the bathroom since there’s only ever ONE stall. I saw a few people run into bushes to go to the bathroom instead, but the forested areas are really only near the start of the course.

This course is hands down the best half marathon one I’ve ever done and I can’t recommend it enough to others. The scenery, path and number of people in this race made it a really enjoyable experience and I’m really glad to have run this one!

Race Results

• Finish Time: 2:08:52
• Pace: 6:07 per kilometer
• Overall placement: 844/1715
• Age group placement (Female 30-34 years): 57/123
• Gender placement (F): 395/1034