Race 17 Northeast GA Spring Half Marathon

About two months ago I came across this half marathon.  I could tell it was a small one, maybe 100 people or so.  However, I could not find any information on time limits.  I'm a back of the pack kinda guy and wanted to find out this.  So I emailed the race director and he responded back with:

From
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2012 9:38 PM
Subject: RE: Question on Northeast Georgia Spring Run Half Marathon

7 days  - seriously, no limit , we wait 

> Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:29:30 -0800
> Subject: Question on Northeast Georgia Spring Run Half Marathon
> To: nega-run@hotmail.com
>
> Hello,
>
> Do you have a time limit for race completion for the half marathon?
>
> Thanks,

Ha!  This has to be one of the greatest responses to that question - ever!  So with that response, I added this half marathon to my calendar.

Another great thing about this race, my daughter also joined me in doing this half.  The race was in Blairsville, Georgia, which is about 90 miles north of us up in the North Georgia mountains.  As there is no direct (interstate) route to get there, we had a nice ride though the winding mountain roads to get there.

We got up there with plenty of time to spare.  Again, this was a low key half marathon (they also had a 5K and a 1 mile walk) with maybe a 100 people and what I really thought was great - proceeds from the event benefited the American Red Cross and Union County groups including Special Olympics, Family Connection, Meals on Wheels, Shop with a Cop, Christmas Give-a-Gift, and Community Easter Egg Hunt.  What a huge contrast to the Georgia Half Marathon we did last month with 10,000+ people doing that race.  We got checked in a hung out for awhile just waiting for the race to start:

At 9:00 we were off.  With so few doing this race, I knew I would be on my own for the most part.  The first couple miles we were on a nice country road.

What impressed me the most, about 50% of the people who passed on this road (in cars & trucks), waved!  The people of Blairsville were just really nice people.  A bit further on down the road I saw this in a front yard - it just seemed like a good picture to take.  : )

For awhile I was thinking that the odds of me getting lost were pretty high.  There were times that I saw no one in front of me and no one behind.  However,  they did a great job in signage and markings on the roads to make sure none of us got lost:

There were a lot of hills.  My favorite section was when we spent a few miles in an area with plenty of trees:

However the last four miles or so, were on a main highway, 65 MPH type.  It was good that they had a lane coned off for us:

Once again, it was great having my daughter there with me.

It was a great day!

Garmin Stats:


Time: 2:39
Average Heart Rate: 146, 89% of max
Calories Spent: 1280
Distance: 13.1 miles
Steps: 49,804




Postscript:

I would like to share a little bit about the significance of my finish time today of 2:39.  I lost my Dad to pancreatic cancer in 2007 and miss him so much.  One of the really neat memories we have of him is his story about 239.  My guess would be that every restaurant in between New Jersey and Florida where he had eaten has heard the story about 239...  He would typically bring this up when ordering beans (like baked beans in a BBQ place).  He would say you can only eat 239 of those beans and just wait for some to ask why...  his answer, the next one is too farty!  So now, in our family, we just remember and think of Dad when anything with 239 comes up.  And today it came up.  It was emotional and my eyes were filled with tears as I crossed the finish line.  I was glad my daughter was there.