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Half Marathon State # 09 Half Marathon #19 |
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On Saturday, May 02, 2015, I ran the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini-Marathon. This race, known as “The Mini” is the largest half marathon and fifth largest road race in the U.S. with near 40,000 runners. The Mini is part of the month-long 500 Festival that leads up to the Indianapolis 500.
For me, this race was the first leg of a back to back half marathon weekend. I paired this with the Cincinnati Flying Pig Half Marathon to accomplished two states in one weekend toward my 50 By 50 Challenge. Because of the back to back races, my only goal for the race was to finish in under two hours.
The weather for the race could not have been better. It was around 52 degrees at the start and increased to around 55 degrees at the finish. The humidity was around 82% with a 3-4 mph wind.
The morning started early, as our friends we stayed with were volunteering for the race. They had to be there at 6:00a, so we followed them to make sure I knew where we were going and where to park. The race start was at 7:45a for my Wave 1, Corral C.
As we walked up to the race start, there was some nice scenery in town. We parked directly across from the OneAmerica Tower (Host for The Mini) & the Capital. However, the most memorable was a monument from 9/11, and several of the beams from the World Trade Center.
We also got to see the official pace car for the Indy 500 later this month.
As I said, our friends were two of the most amazing volunteers for the race. It takes a lot of volunteers to manage 40k runners and 26 corrals. Here they are on their post, doing an outstanding job.
They got the perfect post, between Waves 3 & 4, which was where our Fifty States Half Marathon Club had arranged to meet, so we had our own personal photographers to help us get some photos.
The course is super flat & super fast. You maintain the same elevation for the better part of the entire race.
Thankfully I printed a pace card to help me maintain an accurate pace for the race, otherwise, I could have probably challenged my 1:45 half marathon PR. However, with another race the following day, I had to keep my pace throttled.
