Overall the experience was great. Race report: Interesting course for sure, it was fun passing nice New England Houses, running through a little fishing town, running next to the Atlantic and passing the Bush compound, also very scenic. First third downhill 1 percent, second third rolling hills no incline, third third 1percent incline (more than 700 feet elevation gain overall). Mentally it was ok, did not fade was always there with my head. Kept it together when my left calf started to cramp at mile 20. Lots of Gatorade. It was a very emotional race, I felt some stuff in my legs- hamstring-early on, the the cramping was a bummer, I never had the experience of cramping legs like this. The heat made me work hard. Scary. With the cramps I knew I need to take it easy and be resourceful. So I flushed down Gatorade and made it to the finish. good advice to focus on Gatorade rather than water. Most of the runners had cramps too, it was basically too hot. The race started out hot in the sixties and got hotter 70ies. Physically it was not so bad legs held up despite the cramping which was heat induced so I. In terms of the spiritual aspect, the race was good, I was able to invest myself, although I did not go all out, as I did not want to get injured. Bottom line weather was way too hot, which was good too as I was able to hang out on the beach after the race. My splits were 1:42:49 for the first half and 1:55:21 for the second half explained by the cramping and suboptimal race strategy; I needed to slow down; lost about 2-3 min per mile for the last 6 miles of the race. positive splitting for many runners ( heat and hills) My time was 3:38:10 and I placed 3rd in my age group. I wanted to run 3:30 which was not possible because it was too hot so I think. I ran 10 min faster than in my first m in October 2013. Lessons learned no shortcuts in marathoning. The journey goes on. | 