Like last year, the Sacramento California International Marathon (CIM) was the last race of my running season (more like a full year really).

While I was complaining of the cold weather last year, I should have bit my tongue because that was nothing compared to what we got this year. The race started with a sub-freezing temperatures (low 30s) and never reached higher than the upper 40s. Like someone else mentioned to me later, I think I did not feel my fingers for the first 20 miles of the race.

My goal was to finish in 3:20, a challenging goal based on my latest races. Still, I thought I would give it a try and try to run with the 3:20 pace group. Unlike last year, I found the pace group at the beginning of the race and managed to stick with it for the first half marathon where I was still right on pace (1:40). Not surprisingly, that pace was too fast and I soon lost the group. By mile 22, I had slowed down almost 1 minute per mile. I finally completeed the second half marathon in 1:45 for a final time of 3:25:25.

After running so hard, I was really looking forward to some food but I have to say the after race food area was really badly organized with only one very slow line.  Frankly, CIM is really well organized in general but that sucked. Gladly, Alicia was here to take care of me and bought me 2 hot dogs that I swallowed without thinking about the culinary/dietetic consequences. Those were yummy and definitely helped me recover faster.

I am happy with my new marathon PR beating last year by more than 4 minutes. Still, I am not running fast enough to hope to qualify for Boston anytime soon. So, for the next year, I will focus on getting faster and to do that, I plan on running mostly half marathons until I am able to complete one in 1:30 or less. I want more speed!