Run & Ride King's Island Half Marathon Report

The Run & Ride King's Island Half Marathon was my first pacing gig for Beast Pacing. Beast has a lot of races, and I've been trying to get on their calendar for a while. I was supposed to pace another race with Beast the week before King's Island, but had to cancel that due to my calf injury at Air Force Half Marathon. For the King's Island race, I was mostly recovered and pretty sure that I would be just fine pacing. And I was...but that doesn't mean it was an easy day.


The Beast Pacing team for Run & Ride King's Island - with my injury history, there was NO WAY I was going to jump!

The Run & Ride race series puts on running events at several amusement parks across the country. Runners get to run through and around the parks, and then be guests at the park after the race. Sounded like a fun day to me, and King's Island is not far from home, so I expressed interest in this race as soon as the call for pacers went out. I got the 3:00 pacer slot. There was also a Sweeper slot, which I temporarily switched to after my injury. But then I met my fellow pacer Lynne at packet pick-up, and she was happy to switch back with me when she learned that my injury was better.

I stayed over in Mason, Ohio (outside Cincinnati), where King's Island is located. It was much easier for me than driving down early in the morning. (And also allowed me some time to visit Cincinnati breweries.) We weren't able to get our pacer shirts at packet pick-up the evening before, so I still needed to arrive early on race day. I was one of the first ones there. I guess there isn't a huge need to be early for a smaller race like this, which has loads of parking (it is a theme park, after all). I found the other Beast pacers and we decided to meet up a little later for a group photo. Then I found Abbi, who drove up from Louisville for the race. She had Glenn with her, and they each brought their kids, who would be running the kid's race.


Charlie Brown all ready for the Great Pumpkin

My first Beast gig - ready to roll

Closer to race time there was more light in the sky. There was a Half Fanatics photo and a Beast Pacing photo at the start corral. It was good to see Andrew again (the Cincinnati Marathon Maniacs ambassador), and to meet the other pacers. Jascia was a pacer and also the Cincinnati Half Fanatics ambassador. Lots of serious runners with serious race resumes!

Half Fanatics - at least some of us

I lined up in the small corral behind most of the other pacers. Lynne lined up behind me. There were a handful of runners who planned to do around 3:00, so I chatted with them for a bit. I told them I was planning to do 2.5 minute run intervals followed by 1 minute walk intervals. Two of the ladies had come from Texas and were running half marathons in the 50 states; they had run in Indiana the day before, and this was to be their Ohio race. One guy came all the way from Florida. Most of the others were local or semi-local.

Start corral - you can see all the orange Beast Pacing signs

The race started and I set out at my 3:00 pace, which is so natural to me at this point. I could do this pace half-asleep. It's slower than I run on my own, but it is the only pace that I have ever done as an official pacer. Our first two miles were pretty much in the parking lot. Yes, it was a huge parking lot, and we did a lot of zigzagging across it. That was obviously not the most interesting part of the course, and since this was a two-loop course, we'd come back to it again. Eventually, we entered the park. We did some mileage both in the "public" parts of the park, and also on the employee-only access roads. It reminded me a little bit of running Disney races through the theme parks with no guests there yet, and only a handful of employees getting set up for the day.

Behind some of the rollercoasters there were some very steep hills. I did more frequent run/walk intervals as I often do on long or steep hills, at 30 seconds run, 30 seconds walk. At the 3:00 pace, runners are just not prepared to run up long, steep hills, and breaking it up into smaller chunks helps us to crest the hills much faster than walking only. It worked for a while, and then the three main runners (the Texans and Floridian) had to drop back and run with Lynne. Did I say that those hills were steep? I'm really not kidding. Whoever designed this course had a sadistic streak. They were even too steep to run down safely. But, I was a pacer, so I couldn't fall back.

In the park

Up close and personal with some coasters

The next bits of the course I ran alone. Sweeper Lynne and the last three runners were behind me, and we were also being passed by quarter marathoners who started their race after ours. Eventually, we were passed by fast guys who were finishing their second loop of the half marathon.

One thing I noticed about this course was that the mile markers were not placed evenly. This, and the crazy hills, made it difficult to hit even mile splits. I knew I was roughly on pace, but my Garmin mile indicators pretty much never lined up with the course mile markers. As a pacer, I'm trained to go by the physical mile markers, not my watch. But that is hard when they are not evenly placed. At the halfway point I was a couple minutes behind pace. Lynne was visibly behind me with the three runners once I cleared the halfway timing mat and started my second loop of the parking lot. But then I didn't see her following me. I was in the back, and I saw a bike sweeper in front of me following some slightly faster runners. I know I was a little behind, and would be able to make it up in the second loop. But - Lynne and the three runners with or near her were not allowed to start their second loop. My heart was breaking for them since they came so far, and they really weren't more than a couple minutes behind me. Why have a Sweeper if the Sweeper was going to be swept?

If I recall, King's Island's Eiffel Tower is a 1/3 scale replica; kinda small to me since I saw the real one in April at Marathon de Paris (check out this blog and this one)

So, I did my second loop mostly on my own too. The quarter marathoners were finished, of course. I did pass some half marathoners who had slowed down. At times, I ran with them for short bits. Everyone seemed to be doing well, even if they had slowed down. No one was in distress of any kind, and so I kept up my pace, or rather picked up my pace slightly to make up the couple minutes I needed. When I passed the bike sweeper, he told me that everyone who was still on the course would be allowed to finish. That was good...but it didn't help Lynne and her runners. This bothered me for the entire second loop, and because I was mostly alone, I had a lot of time to think about it.

Fun section of the park, running among the animated dinosaurs

Many of the dinosaurs were in their Halloween costumes; this one was a bee

My favorite dinosaur was a cowboy

This dinosaur was a very angry wizard

Finally, I got to Mile 12. My watch showed 2:40, which meant I had 20 minutes in which to do the last 1.1 mile. That didn't seem right. Pacing a 3:00 half marathon means doing a 13:44 minute mile. In order to do a 20:00 mile I had to stop and walk, which I did. I wasn't sure what was going on there. But then I realized that the Mile 12 sign was way too early, and I had to pick up the pace again. This was the hardest pacing gig I've ever done, in terms of maintaining even splits. It just wasn't possible.

Big hill: I'm standing at the top of the hill looking backward..move your eyes back, under two loops of the coaster, then see the road in front of the building, where it goes back uphill - there's a runner running down; zoom for full effect - it's a crazy-steep hill!

I saw Robert, our Beast team leader, as I was coming in for my finish. I finished in exactly 2:59:59. We had a chat about the course markings and the fact that the course was short overall - another challenge for a pacer. The only reason I was able to come in on time as I did was because after the first loop, I knew what to expect - Mile 12 signage notwithstanding. Then an official who may have been the race director approached us. She mentioned that the runners who had been with Lynne were upset that they were swept. Of course they were. She asked how my pacing had been. I admitted that I was just behind pace at the halfway mark. She asked if I knew about Lynne's pace. I told her that Lynne couldn't have been more than a couple minutes behind me, so I was surprised that she was not allowed to start the second loop. We learned that the park was enforcing a very hard time-of-day cut-off for the second loop so that they could open the parking lot to traffic. Because the race started later this year, that meant that the sweeper needed to be faster this year, at least on the first loop. I asked why there was even a Sweeper to begin with if they wanted that person to keep a 14:00 pace, which was just over my pace. Shouldn't the 3:00 hour pacer have really been the sweeper? Having Lynne out there gave the runners a false sense of security. Yes, the published required pace was 14:00 according to the website, so technically, the three runners did not keep up, but still...

Cute Snoopy medal, and this yellow cloth was a buff, not the shirt; the shirt was red with the Charlie Brown zigzag print

I was still disheartened as I said goodbye to Robert and Jascia. I got cleaned up and changed and then got in touch with Abbi to meet her crew in the park. I had to pay $15 for my park ticket. Pacers didn't get a free entry.

The rest of the afternoon was fun, riding rollercoasters with friends. But the jarring of the coasters, especially the wooden ones, did my lingering headache no good. I had to leave early because I was miserable.


We ran into Andrew in the park; represented here: Marathon Maniacs ambassadors from Columbus (me, wearing the race shirt), Cincinnati (Andrew) and Louisville (Abbi)

The funny graveyard in the park; a commentary on our society

Final thoughts about the Run & Ride King's Island Half... Cool concept, but more than a week later I'm still upset about the Sweeper fiasco. I'm upset about the poorly spaced mile markers and the short course, which made the job tough for all of us. I did like the parts of the course that were inside the park. But unlike Disney races, there were no character photo ops or any form of entertainment besides the DJ at the start/halfway/finish area. The aid stations were well-staffed; the volunteers were really great, as they are at most races. There was both water and Gatorade at most, if not all, aid stations, and there were gels at a couple points on the course. The shirt and the medal were fun with a Peanuts theme, and our packets contained the buff and a magnet. Pacers got a Run & Ride specific pacer shirt, so we didn't need to wear our regular Beast Pacing shirt. That was a bonus, but I think Pacers should have been given free park entry. I didn't get any food because I was talking to Robert and the race director while they were packing it up, but at least I managed to snag a bottle of water before it was too late. So - a day with some plusses and some minuses. Would I pace it again? Yes, mainly out of spite.