Green Shirt=Good Half

My green UA shirt made it's second half-marathon appearance this weekend at the Baltimore Running Festival. And, just as Mike fell in love with the girl in the green shirt (GS) I feel that green shirts bring good luck to all...okay, maybe not all, but I had a great half on Saturday. I know that I have been complaining about the Baltimore course for the past few months, but I have to say I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the course.

Baltimore is a city of neighborhoods; and it was cool to see how each neighborhood responded to the marathon. For example-we started at mile 13 of the marathon course; and blended with the marathoners at mile 14 or so...Canton is a very yuppy neighborhood. Many folks were camped out on their freshly rehabbed rowhomes with a nice cup of coffee or a bloody mary with their neighbors. We then moved into the east side ghetto and lots of kids were outside cheering us on. I really enjoyed the high school marching bands in this section of the race. My favorite neighborhood was Charles Village-they love the marathon! Almost everyone was outside in a three block section complete with large speakers playing inspirational music, and the famous Gummy Bear Man with approximately 150 pounds of gummy bears. They also offered additional snacks as this was also mile 23 of the marathon. We proceeded through the west side and I ran part of my commute---I was feeling really strong and I think that I channeled some road rage and started to kick it into high gear...Ran through Camden Yards to the finish; and saw 2:11 on the clock---I figured it took me about 3 minutes to get to the start so I thought I ran about a 2:08---apparently the clock was wrong, as my chip time was 2:14---but I am staying with the clock-as it was in my favor and beat Austin by a couple of minutes.

Regardless, I loved it---great inspiration for the big race in 2 weeks---can't wait!