Love to post RTB race reports...Here's Trev Dakan's Mercer Half Ironman Report...

Got there with plenty of time and warmed up well.  Work this week was the toughest it has been in more than a year with 2 people out I did a lot of work and it was supposed to be taper week. I didn't feel real snappy, but good enough.  I was running around warming up deciding how many layers to wear when I heard 4 min  till the gun.  I thought I better get down there. 
The chute was very narrow and me being a newbie didn't know about pacing areas. I saw some RTB friends and jumped in with them. They asked if I was still going for 1:30? I said yes. They said you'd better move up, you're with the 10min/mile pace group.  I said, no worries, I'll just run along side them and hit my starting pace.  Mistake number one.  Ran 8:30/mile for the first two miles it was so narrow.

Finally got into the low sevens around mile four.  Things were starting spread out a little and I was running my race now.  I was hoping to run 1:30 but the beginning crushed that. I kept thinking about "the big hill" at the end everyone warned my of, so I thought I better hold a little back. Ran b/t 6:45 and 7:10 for most of the miles.  After the hill, I  finally decided it was time to go hard.  I passed people left and right.  And felt good.  On the last hill one guy I passed about a mile back overtook me, and I said nice kick as he went past.  The last 150 meters or so was actually down hill and there were 4 people between me and the finish, one of them the guy that just passed me. So I kicked it in to a full sprint and blew passed  all of them, including the dude who passed me right at the finish. So no one passed me the whole day.

Obviously since no one passed me and I was able to sprint fully at the end, I had too much left in the tank. I saved too much.  With the horrible start and the fear of the hill I didn't get where I wanted to be, but still it was fun running that far. Time flew by.  And now I know I can go harder next time and to be a dick get to the front even if they were all there first. 

Bottom line 1:34.01. I just signed up for the Seattle R&R half.  I think I am hooked on this running thing.

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