Maui Half Marathon Race Report

Let me begin by saying I’m THRILLED with how my race turned out. You may wonder why I say that because it was my third worst half-marathon time of the 12 I’ve done. The only two that were worse also took place in Maui. That’s because Maui may be the best place on Earth to relax, swim, snooze or meander, but it’s not that great for quality distance running. Just for context, the winner of the women’s marathon ran a 3:14 – seven minutes ahead of the second-place finisher.

The half-marathon begins and ends at Whaler’s Village, in the middle of hotel row at Kaanapali. The course is flat and much of it is along the shore, making for a very scenic run. We all lined up in the dark, and while the clock started at 5:30 (which is when the marathon began on the other side of the island), our race didn’t begin until five minutes later. Also, they didn’t use chip timing, which meant clock time was different from gun time, which was different from individual time. Needless to say, I started my watch when I crossed the starting and finish lines and relied on it exclusively.

My goal was to go sub-2, which should have been a piece of cake considering my training runs leading up to the race and my mile race on Saturday afternoon.

Mile 1 – 9:49
Mile 2 – 9:21
Mile 3 – 8:38
Mile 4 – 9:45

The first four miles take you down the highway to Front Street in Lahaina, and two things became clear very early on: 1) the sun had just come up, but it was already hot with no breeze; and 2) at least a few of the mile markers were off. I had grape Gatorade with me, and there were plenty of aid stations, so I figured it would be fine.

Mile 5 – 9:14
Mile 6 – 8:46

I hit the turnaround point at 59 and change, so I was right on target, but I was soaked to the skin and I knew my heart rate was way up. I resolved to keep mucking along until mile 8 and then see if I needed to revise.

Mile 7 & 8 – 16:37

My average pace to this point was 9:01, which I was pretty happy with, but I was boiling over and dialed it way back for the home stretch. The mile markers on the return were massively screwed up, since the half-marathon markers should have been 0.1 further down the road from the marathon mile markers, and they were more like a half-mile down the road. I crossed the finish line 6:25 after I crossed the 12 mile marker, to give you some idea.

I took it nice and easy the whole way back, enjoying the supportive crowd and the view. My only complaint is there were no ice-cold sponges this year, and we could have used them in the 74 degree heat and 83% humidity.

I took 54 minutes to cover the last 5.1, giving me a finish time of 2:06:12. As pathetic as that was, it was a Maui PR of more than 11 minutes, and good enough for 278th of the 1,020 finishers (18th of 37 in age group).

I got my plastic lei and medal, then posed with my grape Gatorade tongue.

Then I availed myself of the freezing cold shower.

One large Americano later, and I’m almost human.

If you ever get a chance to run in Maui or any other Hawaiian island, don’t pass it up. It’s a terrific addition to any vacation. But if you want to run for time, train in the heat and humidity and keep your goals realistic. Apparently there were quite a few heat-related problems for the marathoners.