Raleigh Rocks Race Report by Fifty States HALF Marathon Club member Ashby W Spratley III
Raleigh Rocks Half Marathon - my 21st or 22nd half - my comments about the race -
Good race - nice event - smaller than I expected but nice - weather was good very good considering the storm that went through the area last night, we had hail in Garner - I enjoyed the race and felt the race was well done - I had no problem with the route and liked it - I was able to get a fair number of photos of other runners running toward me on the two out and back portions - I had had several people tell me that the race was not very good in the past but I found it to be fine not perfect but pretty good - the water station near mile 7 was packed up when I got there - this was the same water stop for mile 11 or so but there was water at about mile nine - I felt sure that most of the runners would not have seen this just us BOTPs (back of the packers) and I also feel if you are a BOTP one should know this can happen and make sure you carry water and everything else you might need - at about mile 12 some guy came riding toward me carrying about a dozen bottles of water and was offering them to the runner who were still out there - I took one - I thought this was pretty cool - I heard at the finish line it was the race director on the bike. I do not know if this was true - there did not seem to be any medical aid stations but there were medics on bikes riding around - there were only about 5 bands along the route - I was expecting more but all were still there playing when I went by which was very cool - the medal is pretty nice and I like it - I would recommend this race - this is my sixth race in six weeks and I believe it is taking a toll on me - I push as hard as I could and got a much slower time than I had hoped for, but I did finish and that is always good - next two weeks is some weekend cycling with some recover running during the weeks.
