Today I ran the Brooksie Way 1/2 Marathon (13.1 miles) for the 2nd consecutive year. My official time was 1:52:09 (hh:mm:ss), which was 23:26 (mm:ss) faster than my first. This is also a personal best for me with a near 18% improvement over last year's time.

The Brooksie Way is a challenging race that can catch runners off guard if they don't know the course. The first six and half miles are relatively flat and downhill, so it is easy to start off too fast. Then the course makes an abrupt change and turns into about four miles of continuous hills that can seem like they will never end. But if you can save for the energy for the end, there is a nice two mile mostly downhill stretch to the finish. This is my favorite part of the course because I can make up some of the time I lost on the hills and finish strong.