Wednesday, December 28, 2011

2011 Recap: From Doughnut Holes to Stripper Poles

2011 Bling
OK, in theory my race season started underground at The Groundhog Run 10k but I also didn't see any stripper poles while I was in Vegas either.  It has a nice rhyme to it though, right?

I'm going to do my best to NOT write another novel but to bullet point this year and some goals for new year.

Highlights
  • Did my first triathlon!  That was the whole goal of this thing, right?  I followed that up with 5 more swim/bike/run events.
  • Met a TON of cool people whether that be online through Twitter and Dailymile but many of them in real life: Drew, Bryan, Kyle, Travis, Mark, Ryan, Mark, Lori, Becca, Jeff, and probably a bunch of others I can't remember right now (I'm trying to keep this short, remember!!)
  • Found the competitive bug.  By August I was really trying to compete.
  • Experienced my first race/training related injury.  Required a lot of mental adjustments.
  • Completed my first half-ironman within my main time goal, under 6 hours!
  • Completed my second full marathon under the glitz of Las Vegas.  Missed my PR by 61 seconds.  Pretty good considered I had 3.5 weeks of training + all the other fun that came with it.
  • Commuting to/from work!  Even one time by foot!
Reflections
  • Nutrition is important.  I focused on race day nutrition this year, especially for my endurance events.  Working on this during training was extremely important because I often did fairly long workouts before I left for work.  Proper nutrition kept me from passing out at work.
  • Time in the Swim/Saddle/Street.  Training for the half-ironman was crazy.  Even though I got injured and readjusted my training, I still got my largest volume weeks in.  It was the speed work weeks that got cut short.  I found out I am capable of getting up at 3:30am to get a bike ride in or 4:00am for a run so I can get to the gym for a swim at 5:30am.
  • Competitive Nature.  As mentioned above, I like the competitive nature of triathlons.  It's one thing to run a 5k but to see how you compare to other participates from an individual sport (even transitions!) to the entire event is quite driving.
  • Training partners kick ass.  I did a few training runs in the 2010 with family and friends but 90% of my miles were alone.  I really enjoyed training with friends and family in 2011, especially Joe VI.  Even though he may not realize it, but he kept me going back in September and October when I really wanted to just sit at home and "nurse" my broken rib.  Pretty much all my training during that time was with Joe.  I'm looking forward to training with Joe in 2012.... even if two months of that will be remotely (see below).
Speaking of 2012
  • BQ.  If you haven't caught on what BQ by now means... well, 2012 is my year to Boston Qualify.  That's the goal.  My entire year will be dedicated to running 26.2 at a 7 mile pace.  Note: I completed the Las Vegas Marathon with an average 8:53 pace.  I have A LOT of work to do.  My "A" race will be the Chicago Marathon on October 7th but I may target a marathon in early September if I feel like I'm ready.
  • Strength Training.  I skipped all planned strength training in 2011.  I may seek a trainer at the gym to help me with this but we'll see.  I'm still not going to be able to show you how to get to the muscle beach, but I want a nice strong core to keep me running upright.
  • Triathlons will be used for cross training.  I do enjoy them but I'm going to swim and bike as cross training.
  • Nutrition.  I'm going to STOP the mentality of "I race so I can eat".  I need to be smarter about my daily intake of foods.  Granted, I'm still eating a Z-Man post-race.  Can't break tradition.
  • Training abroad.  I will be traveling to Bangkok, Thailand for work during February and March. I'm hoping to take advantage of the warmer temperatures during that time to get some good speed and distance runs in.... that is while I'm not working or sightseeing.
  • I've got some big Big BIG plans for 2012 that will come to light soon enough. 
  • All of this will require plenty of balance and planning in my life.  A happy wife is a happy life!  
The Beach2Battleship Pint was custom made.  One of my favorite Christmas presents from TKB!

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Race Report: Rock'n'Roll Las Vegas Marathon

I'll just say upfront here that there were many well-documented issues with this race.  From my post, Twitter, and Rock'n'Roll's own Facebook page.  Since I've given my thoughts already, I'll focus on my race and only bring up the issues when necessary to further the story.

Rock'n'Roll Las Vegas Marathon


The Rock'n'Roll Las Vegas Marathon (RnRLV) appeared on my schedule back in June when my sister-in-law, Rebecca (TKB's brother's wife), told us that if she was to ever do a half marathon, this was the race.  It was VERY enticing.  Running the Las Vegas Strip at night?  How could anyone miss that opportunity!  It was truly the first of its kind in terms of size and glamour.  We had never been to Las Vegas in our adult form.  It was the perfect scenario!  Race?  Check.  Vacation?  Check.  Spending time with family? Check.  Well, as it turned out it was more of a perfect storm.

Trip
We arrived Thursday evening around 7pm local time (9pm KC time).  We went directly to the Luxor to checkin.  After dropping luggage off on our 5th floor room, we had dinner at one of the restaurants at the Luxor.  This started the constant inflow of water.  Travel always dehydrates me and I knew there would be lots of walking coming up, need to make sure the wheels are well greased.

I didn't have a lot of trouble sleeping, but I woke up at 5am local time (7am KC time) and just messed around on the computer chatting with other RnRLV twitter peeps until TKB woke up.  She started coming down with a cold earlier that week so she slept in a bit. We decided to try to make it up to the Expo and meet some of the folks on twitter but it takes so long to get anywhere in Vegas, we turned at around the Paris hotel and went back to the Luxor when Jake and Rebecca arrived.

But later that day...



we then walked back up to the Venetian with Jake and Rebecca for the Expo and Packet Pickup.  This was around 5pm on Friday and it really wasn't that bad.  I know there have been complaints about the Expo but we may have missed most of the rush since it was dinner time.  I bought some merch and ANOTHER pair of running shoes (I think I still have a post I need to publish on that... guess I need to add onto it).

Bibbity bibbity bop!  Yes, I'm kinda tall.  Yes, Rebecca is kinda short.
By Saturday my sleep schedule was pretty much normal.  After walking 6 - 7 miles on Friday, it was easy to get a full nights sleep.  We took it easy on Saturday and went through the Titanic exhibit at the Luxor and saw Cirque du Soleil: Ka at MGM Grand. Very cool show.  I wish we had time to see more of the Cirque performances while there. After Cirque we went up to the Paris hotel via taxi and found some food to eat.

Overall Nutrition
I tried to have a bottle of water in my hand the entire time and avoid alcohol and sodie pop.  I did have a couple beers at dinner Friday night but that was it until after the race. I tried to consume at least one carb loaded meal each day starting on Tuesday early in the week.

Pre-Race
With the gun time at 4:00pm Sunday night, pre-race required some thought.  First was trying to be kind to the legs for the days leading up to the race.  Las Vegas requires a lot of walking to go anywhere and as Jake mentioned, it's the land of misdirection.  It's easy to get lost and have to retrace your steps in the casinos.  We took escalators and people movers whenever possible.

Well, not all the escalators were working.

I woke up around 8 o'clock and started to get ready for the day.  TKB's cold was really starting to hate on her so I went down and bought some water, Pumpkin Spice Latte (me), hot chocolate (TKB), and some lemon and pumpkin loafs at one of the THREE Starbucks in the Luxor (Yes, you can see one of the Starbucks from the line of the other).  She really rallied on Sunday to keep that cold at bay. She was quite a trooper!

While I missed the Tweetups, I did get in touch with @TriBeccaTO who I have been following since I started @ScottyTris.  So it was really cool to meet her for the first time, as well as @reflectiverunr, aka Jeff, (who I had to admit I wasn't following... until a few minutes later).  Becca and Jeff both have blogs too.  They were both in town to be spectators for the event, so cool!  We met up for lunch, which was simply a food court in the Fashion Show Mall.  What to eat was a hard decision!  Generally, four hours before a race I'm sleeping so I wasn't sure what to do, so I stuck with the familiar and had Subway.  We had some fun conversations and people watching while at the food court, it helped to ease the nerves!

Me, Becca, and Jeff! Fashion Show Place Mall.  Where twitter-ers unite!

We went back to the Luxor around 1pm where Jake and Rebecca were looking for lunch.  I decided to get ready and then went over to meet them so Rebecca and I could commiserate with our nerves.  

So much easier than triathlons!

While we were at their restaurant between the Luxor and Mandalay Bay I ate a banana and half of a bagel around 2:00pm.  This is roughly the same time I would eat those before a race anyway.  We went back to our rooms for a few minutes where I finished my race prep and then made the trek over to the starting line around 3:10pm.
Captain Orange!
The temperature was around 50 degrees but I wasn't cold.  We hit the first line of port-a-porties (stopped) and then walked over through to the family meeting areas and then anther line of port-a-poties (stopped again).  I said my goodbyes around 3:45pm and headed off to the corrals.  They did have small bottles of water available so I downed one with my 4 blueberry chomps.

Start


Being tall does have its privileges.
I had no clue what to expect.  I've never been in a race with this many marathoners (6,000), let alone the entire race participant pool of 44,000.  Corrals were new to me.  I was in corral 6 but I simply targeted the 4:00 pace group (which was in corral 6).  That's 4 hour paced group, not 4 minute mile pace group.  Just for clarification.  Shortly after 4pm we were off!  I finally crossed the start at 4:09 as they staggered the corrals.  After a short distance we turned left to head off to the dessert!  Well, west Las Vegas.

Miles 1 - 6
Pretty easy moving.  There were a lot of people but plenty of room to run and maneuver.  There were a lot of turns during the first six miles.  I mean A LOT. 18 turns.  I did the best as possible to stay to the inside of the turn to keep from adding extra miles.  A couple times I misjudged and swung out left in preparation for a left turn but then realized it was a right turn.  A lot of this course was sort of a loop.  Some sections you ran back on and others you went around the block to back track.  It was cool seeing the elites running by as they returned on the road.

About mile 1 in people (ok, men) started peeling off the course to dump some extra payload.  I couldn't believe it.  For the full participants there were no lines at the port-a-poties.  I didn't count but there were probably 100 holes.

Physically I was doing awesome.  No knee issue and only slight discomfort on the bottom of my feet.  Cardio-wise my heart rate was in the 150s.  It was in the upper zone of my training range, which is just fine.  That's actually low for my racing zone.  I was keeping it there on purpose in case my legs decided to fall apart.  Around mile 2 I had already left the 4 hour pace group.

Around mile 4 I heard someone say "Olathe" during a conversation and I turned my head to find someone wearing a KC Marathon finishers shirt!  He was chatting with a female runner from KC. This wasn't really surprising as there were a good chunk of runners on our plane flights to and from KC.  We all chatted for a bit and then I broke off.  I'm pretty sure he was hitting on her during the race.  As much as I would have loved to hear that outcome, I was looking for the Strip to entertain me.  Off I went!

One Gu packet down at mile 5.  It tasted so good! 

Miles 6 - 13.1
12 more turns.  At this point I was taking water at each aid station and then realized something.  While I haven't trained with Cytomax I need to start taking it in.  There was no Gatorade or Powerade on this course and I was going to need those electrolytes.  

Mile 8 brought on the first of two aid stations with Gu. Now, this is when I start to get stupid.  I reached out for a Gu packet.  The guy had some trouble handing one to me and I ended up with two.  I had planned to consume 5 Gu packets during the race (one every five miles, even 25 to help aid recovery); therefore, I put 5 Gu packets on my race belt.  The stupid part is I didn't need to take a Gu packet at the aid station and I ended up with two.  So I then had to put them somewhere.  Putting Gu packets on race belts are not easy, especially on the run.  Yes, I could have dumped them on the ground but my triathlete blood wouldn't let me (no littering in triathlons).

While at mile 8 I decided see how I was doing in terms of catching up to the 3:55 pace group.  My body was still feeling great and I was willing to boost the speed.  Around mile 9.3 there is a turn around and I figured out I was a couple hundred yards away!  Sweet!  Thoughts of a PR started to enter my mind.  Granted, I sadly couldn't remember what my PR was.  Doh!

Somewhere about this time I started to think about Rebecca and that she was about to start her very first half marathon!!!

Photo of Rebecca... About to ROCK!

I had another Kansas City runner sighting as I come up to a runner wearing a KCMO Police shirt.  I would have said hello (and thanks) but he was jamming out to his tunes.  

I finally caught up to the 3:55 group.  I don't remember when I did, but I was definitely with them at mile 13.  

Miles 13.1 - 19
I hit the wall.  Yes, I know I said I was feeling great physically by taking in Gu/liquids as planned.  My heart rate was actually in the 140s (although I think I had some problems with the heart rate monitor reading low).  That wall?  It was a wall of 38,000 half participants being released for their race.  

Wow, oh wow.  We were informed via e-mail that there would be a full and half lane.  I had no clue where that was until I saw a cyclist yelling that full on the left and half on the right.  No chance.  There were just too many people to control.  I ended up bumping into someone walking the race and loosened my bandaid on my second to last toe on my left foot (I started having blister problems on that toe so I taped it) making me concerned about starting the blister again.  Just so you know, I did apologize as I went past. I was trying to be as polite as possible.  

The next 6 miles was simply bouncing around trying to find an opening.  As I mentioned in my previous post, even if all these people were in the correct corral, they were still moving 2 minutes per mile slower than my pace.  It was worse than when you start a crowded race and zig-zag around people to find an opening in the first half mile... but for 13.1 miles.  I was running on the sidewalk on the outside of the course cones, behind aid stations, around police cars, sprinting through openings.  It was nuts.  

The second half to the course isn't quite an out and back, there are a few more turns.  Because full participants were to stay on the sidewalk side of the street they couldn't take the tangents necessary; however, I said screw that.  I took the corners as I normally did but I returned to my lane as soon as possible.

Gu at mile 15 down without a problem.  The aid stations were a mess here.  They couldn't keep up.  Word is the water was from fire hydrants too.  I took Cytomax when I could find it... but it was hard to tell.  A few of the aid stations had ice in the cups.  Really?  Ice?  I'd rather have warm water than iced water.

As for my pace?  I lost the 3:55 group initially but caught back up with them and eventually broke off.  I had hoped that I was way ahead of them so I could possibly meet up with the 3:50 pace group but before I knew it, they were passing me.  It was just too hard to get that consistent open lane.

Miles 19 - 26
This is the section of a marathon where things typically start to fall apart.  Bolts start flying off the machine, shoes strip apart like they are in a wind tunnel, limbs are found on the curb.  Ok, not really but it can be bad.  Your mind plays games and you have to negotiate with it to see the next mile marker or light post.  In an odd switch-a-roo, having people to dodge like crazy helped me win this mental battle.

After mile 20 I decided to stop and stretch.  I took my 4th Gu and took off again. I didn't wait too long because I didn't want to lose my lead on the 3:55 group.  Everything was feeling pretty good.  My feet was having pains but I could tell it wasn't a blister or cuts.  It was simply in pain for taking the pounding.

I came up on the mile 22 aid station, the second station with Gu.  Because I was still dodging people and staying mostly on the sidewalks I was behind the aid station and reached for a Gu packet.  Remember, I was being dumb.  I only needed one more Gu packet and I was already + 2 packets from the first aid station.  I saw blueberry and then vanilla.  I then realized I had two handfuls of Gu packet (maybe 5).  WHAT WAS I DOING!  I didn't need these and I was being greedy.  Considering the vast amount of gels on these tables, I doubt I was causing a problem with these aid stations running out but I still feel bad.  So I ran with them in my hands for a while thinking I would drop them off at the next aid station.  

I ended up consuming one of them and putting the rest of them on my race belt.  (I think my guilt set in today as I ordered two full boxes of Gu packets.)  Eating that extra Gu packet was a bad idea as it did bug my stomach for a couple miles.  I guess it was redemption from the aid station fairy.

Before too long I looked up and saw the Mandalay Bay hotel.  The end was near!  I knew I still had a couple miles to go but the end was end sight!  At this point I changed my watch to show total race time and it was going to be close for me to PR.  I tried to finally take in the views of the strip too.  That was not possible for the trip north.

I was fairly surprised that I was actually able to pick up the pace during the last 10k, I was still sub-9 minute miles.  In my long runs I was slowing down a minute per mile or more at this point.  I guess my taper was well timed.

Miles 26 - 26.2
They had mile makers for the entire race but I was just assuming they left this one on the truck.  It took FOREVER.  Yes, I had my Garmin on but I didn't want to look at it.  I was expecting to see the finish where we started but instead you turn up a small hill and finish in the parking lot.  That's where I found the 26 mile marker.  385 yards to go!!

I crossed the finish line in 3 hours, 54 minutes, 49 seconds.  Missing my PR by 61 seconds.

Overall: 972 out of 3766
Gender: 755 out of 2380
Age Group: 153 out of 435

The battle scars are mental.
Post-Race
Now think of your a typical race.  What's the first thing you expect to after receiving your medal?  Someone handing you water, yogurt, bagel?  How about thousands of people waiting to get through the FINISHERS PHOTO?  They forced you through about 10 lines of finish line photos.  Fortunately I was far enough to the edge I could sneak around them and finally find water and then a bottle of Cytomax.  Food?  Green bananas, marathon bars, GoGurt, bagel, and pretzels.  Luckily I heard someone say "do you want a yellow banana" as she was opening a new bag and I grabbed one of those.

I had planned to hang in the finishers area and soak it all in but I then realized there was nothing to soak in other than thousands of other participant's sweat.  So I texted Tricia and we met up at the "K" sign.  (The "K" in TKB).  After she and Jake found me we decided to move back to the finish line and watch for Rebecca.  She was closing in on the end.  While there was maybe 1 full participant crossing the finish line every few seconds, there was probably 10 - 15 half participants.  We almost missed Rebecca finish but she looked strong!

First Half Marathon in the books!
Rebecca and I decided to get our medals engraved.  This is something I've been contemplating to do with all my medals, so I was fine with it... even unloading the $20 to have someone spend 5 seconds doing it.  Since there was a little bit of a wait, Jake and Tricia sent us inside because the temperature was low 40s at this point.  We were both shaking and the mylar blankets were being whipped up pretty badly by the wind.   It actually started to sprinkle after we made it inside Mandalay Bay.

Leaving the race site was horrible.  It took us probably an hour to get through the Mandalay Bay hotel.  Many people were fainting or getting sick.  The Fire Marshall would have had a field day with this and the medics racing in to help someone probably weren't to thrilled with it either.  Fortunately we didn't have to take a taxi or shuttle to another hotel.  We just had to cross through MB to Luxor.  I feel bad for some of the people who took 3+ hours to get to their hotel.  That was probably longer than it took for them to race!


The mess.  If anyone calls that number, let me know! :)


Yeah, I can tell you what the Fragrance of Las Vegas is while in the mess.

Further into the Mandalay Bay, close to an hour later.


Once we got back to our hotel room TKB helped me do something that is a necessary evil.  Stop thinking about that, you perverts.  This:

First of two trips to the hotel ice machine.

Unfortunately, I was too long for the bathtub but all the hurty bits got a nice 15 minute soak.. or about four Mumford & Son's songs.
The Breakdown
  • The Good
    • Running at night.  It wasn't just the spectacle of the strip but the new challenge it presented compared to a typical morning race.  Plus, you don't go home and take a nap, you go to bed!
    • Meeting a lot of neat people, from the plane flights to meeting people from Twitter.  I wish I could have attended some of the meet ups but it just didn't happen.  On the flight home I sat next to the third place 30 - 34 male age group athlete, who is from Kansas City, Dale Dexter.
    • Glow in the dark medal.  This is fairly unique.  When I got home I hung it from my bedside lamp.  When I woke up with leg pain, it made me giggle to see it hanging there glowing.  
    • Flat Course - If you can finish the first half in 1:30, then you can beat the half start and surely BQ (for men... and women, for that matter!)
  • The Bad
    • See my reflections
    • There were bands on this course?  I'm not complaining about the bands there were on the course. It actually made me giggle that there was a "death metal" band on the course.  I was kind of expecting to have more bands playing consistently on the course.
    • Dump the Cytomax and go with Gatorade/Powerade.  I probably should have stuck with my training regimen and brought my own drink or better planned for the Cytomax.
    • Some people did not get t-shirts at the expo.  HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN?
    • They ran out of half medals.  Ok, this didn't impact me but it's inexcusable.  There were 33,000 finishers of the half with 38,000 registered.  
    • Ice in the water/cytomax.  dumb.
  • The Standard
    • Packet Pickup:  Smooth.  Decent expo. I purchased some fresh-off-the-line Mizuno Wave Inspire 8 at a good discount.  
    • Goodie Bag: T-Shirt, Gu Chomps (which I used pre-race), various flyers.  The best part being a running head lamp.  I could have used that four weeks prior.
    • Communication: 4 - 5 e-mails leading up to the race.  Good web site with lots of information.  Facebook page.  Problem?  They need to emphasize the key elements of this race, such as the half versus marathon lanes
    • Aid Stations: First 13.1 miles were OK but need better communication on where cytomax versus water was located.  Second 13.1 was simply a massive cluster.  It looked like a disaster area.  My advice?  Run behind the tables and pick up your drink.
    • Post-Race: Poorly designed layout.  I'm ok with the food options, but they need to make sure they can handle the number of participants.  Assume people will take more than one.... well, no green bananas.  
    • Port-a-Johns:  Sufficient but I wasn't there for the half start.  I know people were going into casinos when they couldn't wait any longer.  The port-a-potties on the full course we tucked away and hard to find but I managed to not need one the entire race.
    • Parking:  Don't know since we stayed in a hotel.  What I do know is there was a mess leaving the host hotel.
    • Volunteers: I'm always supportive of the volunteers and I think the volunteers were great here.  If there was an issue with a volunteer, it was because they weren't educated on how to handle scenarios.  
    • Route:  Closed to traffic.  Now if they could do a better job with managing the flow of participants.  Lower numbers and better corral management will definitely help.
The Proof
Our home for the four days.

Serious Athletes

Yeah.  I'm just really tall.  This happens a lot.

TKB decided to go for a stroll along the strip but she didn't bring her running clothes.  Oops.

Ironically, Rebecca did too.  Fortunately she picked up clothes at the expo.  She has a similar body type too.  Weird.

WATCH OUT!  Naked runner coming through!!

Yeah, I know what you are thinking.

Stairs?  Why are you taking stairs with all the escalators.

Nice shoes.
Game face!
There's a dude in my beer.
The Mess
This was the start of the half.  A big ole' cluster.




Rock'n'Roll Las Vegas - 24 Hour Reflections


OK...  worked on this post on my iPad while flying home from Las Vegas (keep that in mind when finding weird typing errors :))

The Rock'n'Roll Las Vegas Marathon and Half-Marathon combined to send 44,000 runners down the Las Vegas strip.  If there is one city that can manage that load of humanity it has to be Las Vegas; however, managing that many people within a critical one to two hour window was definite a challenge.  The scenario is this:

4:00p - 4:15p: 6,000 marathoners are released in 9 corral bunches to the west side of the Las Vegas through industrial areas and Larry Flints "fun house".
4:05p: The sunsets
5:30p - 6:30p: A bulk of the marathoners return to the start of the race where they turn north on Las Vegas Blvd to finish the second half of the route
5:30p - 6:30p: 38,000 half-marathoners are released through 40 corrals straight north on the Las Vegas Blvd.

See a problem?

As a full marathon participant it was a huge shock to go from a nice roomy street to total chaos.  I managed to chase down the 3:55 pace group just prior to the turn onto The Strip but as we turned I immediately lost them.  I believe that when I joined the mass of humanity I was probably with the 2:20 half marathon pace group, nearly two minutes per mile slower than my current pace.

To keep the marathoners segregated they set small cones 8 - 10 feet from the sidewalk and there were cyclists riding the line asking half participants to stay in the three to four lanes of road allotted to them.  As you can imagine, they were grossly unsuccessful.  For one thing, the aid stations and port-a-potties required people to cross into the full participants, but that's ok because the aid stations couldn't keep up with the demand.  There were aid stations on the half participants side of the street but it is unrealistic for them to only use those aid stations.

On Twitter there is a ton of discussion on what went wrong.  My thought boils down to this: 44,000 is way too many participants.  But you say this: there are other races that have more than 44k runners and they don't have these issues.  Correct, but they don't mix half and full participants.  However, I don't think that was the issue.  I have run the KC marathon and the half & full start together (granted it's a MUCH smaller event). The issue was having the full start 1.5 hours before the half and expect them to merge together.  Typically they start together but split somewhere on the route.

Unless you are a fast runner (sub-3 hour marathoner), you got caught.  If you were running a sub-1:45 half, you were ahead of the chaos.  I guess I would like to see them do a better job of starting the half-participants with pacing of the full participants.  Although there is another problem.  Within minutes of turning onto The Strip, I literally ran into half-participants.  She was wearing all black and it wasn't very will lit at the time but the problem was she was WALKING.  So within a tenth of the mile she was already walking.  This leads me to believe that people who planned to walk the half-marathon decided to cheat up to a much earlier corral to give them more time to finish or simply so they didn't have to wait over an hour for thier corral to start.

My solution?  I mentioned before, reduce the size of the participants
Fewer participants should equal more room.  I saw on twitter that the average race registration was $165, which means $7.26 million dollars of revenues.  Raise registration costs if you would like to recoup some of that.  People will pay it. An extra 20 or 30 dollars is pretty small compared to the money spent out there.

If the whole draw of this race is to run it at night down the Las Vegas strip then I didn’t get to fully appreciate it because it wasn’t until Treasure Island that I was able to get back in a groove and enjoy the scenery, which really is past all the glitzy scenery.

Better Education
In the emails they mentioned that there would be a full and half lane, as well as cyclists separating the two.  However, there was no follow up.  Not once before the full or half did they mention this.  There were plenty of opportunities during the pre-race countdown to convey this information.  As my brother-in-law, Jake, mentioned during packet pickup when each runners attention was under full control of the packet pickup volunteer they could have discussed this.

3 Events: Full, Half, Walk
Ok, maybe not an official walk category but to provide direction to people who plan to walk the distance or need to walk for an extended time (not everyone plans to walk but things can go wrong and need to).  Maybe a lane similar to that of the marathoners.  Walkers all the way to the right, marathoners on the left and half-marathoners in the middle. Along these lines, I would not recommend starting the two distances at the same time because then you will definitely infuriate the marathoners trying to BQ.  This will only work if you have separate courses or a fully blocked marathon lane.

Aid Stations
I was thinking along the race that I should have tried to remember when the water versus water/cytomax versus water/cytomax/Gu stations were.  However, why try to make us remember and just make it available at each aid station. 
In addition, please include better signage at the aid station (water then cytomax then Gu, etc).  One thing to help would be some how to indicate how long the aid station was so people wouldn't bombard the first few tables and overwhelming the volunteers.

Post-Race
How would you feel if you completed your first (or 50th) half and not received a medal at the end?  Then walked over to get nourishment to found no water or sparse food options.  What about taking 15 minutes to walk between the two because a photo shoot is going on?  This should be an easy fix but it is going to require taking up more of Mandalay Bay's parking area.  Please include 10-foot tall signs to indicate where things are located too. The main issue with the medals is simply that after September 30, you did not have to inform the race officials if you were switching from the full to half.  You just lined up in the half start.  They must have not anticipated that many people switching events.  Then there are the problem of bandits.

Crowd Control
Logistically they need to figure out a better way to get people out of the post-race area.  The only way out was through Mandalay Bay and that took nearly an hour.  People were getting sick for various reasons and emergency personnel called in to attend to them.  We aren't talking 44,000 people here but 100,000+ throughout the night.  The Fire Marshall would have had a field day with this.  The only consolation for us was that we only had to go one more hotel to get "home"; however, others still needed to get a taxi/bus back to their hotel.  One last item:  most restaurants closed up shop at 11pm.  Ravenous runners had to dine on gift shop fare to get their fix.  So this issue is directed at the hotels and not the race.

Final Thoughts
People have mentioned that they won't plan to do this race again because of the organization issues, even some avoiding Rock'n'Roll altogether.  Some joking that RnR has never put on a race before, so it's not a shocker.  The thing is this is new.  No one has done a race like this before at this level of size and complexity (well, that I'm aware of... Chicago and New York don't have to deal with these logistics and they are the only two races with this capacity.)

Just like many things, it's not always a good idea to purchase the first model of a vehicle, even on a redesign.  The same goes for electronics.  Things happen and bugs need to be worked out.  Rock'n'Roll captured data from 44,000 people (and their spectators).  They should be able to design a course that manages this merge much more effectively.

This is by no means my race report but my 24 hour reflection on the event.  I was bored on 3.5 hours of flight.  I don't want you to come across that I'm some snobby marathoner that didn't appreciate having to dodge half-marathoners.  They had to contend with the same issues as the full.  That being said, I wasn't there to PR or BQ.  Had I been trying to do that on this flat course, I would have definitely been miffed and very frustrated.  One of the people on twitter was on pace to BQ until she got to mile 16 and simply couldn't keep up the pace because of the humanity, missing the mark by 25 minutes.  I truly feel bad for her and anyone else in her situation.

Aimee added to her story via twitter:

I fought it as hard as I could until mile 16 or so. The cussing & shoving was a bit extreme. I've never run an event where runners were so mean to one another.  Generally, everyone is very encouraging because we love the same sport. I merged w/ 13.1s that were walking & texting, on phone, 4-5 wide & had NO IDEA 13.1s to the right. The 18inch cones to mark were all kicked over. The people on bikes - not sure of their role but they were a fail. 26.2-ers couldn't run tangents because our lane swung so wide. I've talked to several 26.2-ers that took a DNF because it was so mismanaged. Shame on @RunRocknRoll. #RnRLVFail.
Aimee brings up a great point about the course and tangents.  I decided during my run that if half-participants were in my lane then I entered the half lane to cut the corners whenever I could.  I believe my run distance was 26.4, so I only added .2 miles.  Considering all the turns in the first 13.1, that's pretty good.

OK, that's all I have for now. but my race report will be coming soon.