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Comments: Well, it took about 6 miles for my feet to regain feeling. I will blame my going out too fast on my trying to get blood circulation into my previously frostbitten toes. First mile was a 7:10 split and I said "Uh oh", second mile was 7:19 and I purposely started slowing down. It was hard to let the 3:15 pace group and then later the 3:20 group go by like a stampede of horses, but I was given a plan and I was determined to try to stick to it. Plan was to keep it in zone 2 for the first 2 hours, which for the most part I did, at the very high end of Zone 2. Freezing cold headwinds kicked in somewhere around mile 11 or so and I tucked in behind two big guys. When I hit halfway at 1:40, I was a little worried, as my HR was creeping into Z3 too soon, so I slowed down again. At the 2 hour mark, I was allowed to go into Z3 and this helped me mentally and physically, I had about 4 good mile splits in the 7:50 range....Things were going well and I was feeling good. Saw my cousins at mile 20 and handed off my fuel belt hanging onto one gu and my small bottle. It felt great to take that crazy girdle off! At 2:45, I was starting to fade a little, but my plan called for Z4 to keep the pace under 8. I made it about 1.5 miles at that pace and then I felt my quads screaming...My last 3 miles were 8:19/8:34/8:18 and I think somewhere on that 25th mile, my right calf seized up something fierce and I had to stand off to the side and massage it. One last aid station thankfully, I found a sport drink and it seemed to help. Managed to run it in as hard as possible and tried to ignore the pain as much as possible. Crossing the finish line under 3:30 definitely was a thrill! My first time doing this race was 1999 and I ran a 4:19. 10 years later, a 3:27, and a BQ to boot! What are the chances of that? Age is not a limitation. I'm excited by the possibilities! What would you do differently?: Hold back in the first two miles regardless of HR, just do a steady 7:45 pace. The downhill is deceiving as it is always followed by a roller uphill! Maybe have worn a longsleeve instead of armwarmers and shortsleeves. It was freezing from beginning to end! I do think the windchill kept it under 40F the whole way. Maybe change my nutrition slightly? I did water every 15 minutes and a gu at 1 hour, then 1/2 every 30 minutes after that. My calf cramp could have been from going out too hard at the beginning though, so it's tough to say. I have never had a calf cramp running but then my longest training run was 22 miles.  Post race
Warm down: So my MacGyver floss took about 10 minutes for the volunteer to cut off, he was impressed, I told him he could cut the shoelace off if he wanted, I was freezing! So cold! I got into the massage tent where there were only a few people waiting to see if they could help me out with my calf, which was knotted up. It was nice and warm in there! Grabbed my sweatbag and put warm clothes on. Had a bagel and a soy milk and tried to find my cousin Mark and our cousins but no luck. Made the long trek 10 blocks back to the hotel....ugh. Met my cousins for breakfast at Pancake Circus...cute diner with huge pancakes. Turns out Mark was one minute behind me at the halfway point but had a tough time at mile 18 and on and finished in 3:36. He'll get his BQ with more training. What limited your ability to perform faster: I had a pretty solid 4 months of coached training for this event and did everything asked of me. Thanks Steve! I executed my race plan almost exactly as asked except for those first 2 miles which were probably a little bit more in zone 3 than zone 2. Cold headwinds slowed my pace a bit and calf cramp at the end. Honestly, only about 2 years of triathlon and only one year of endurance training is something to build on. More experience physically and mentally will strengthen my resolve and ability to perform faster and longer. I am excited by the possibilities. Thankful for having a supportive family and friends. swbkrun mg rocks! Event comments: Great course with lots of music along the way. It was hard to get food at the end, the lines were crazy. Volunteers were awesome, they were all bundled up and then having to hand out cold cups of water, wow! I would definitely do this race again. Sure wish it were held in late October, but the cold is a good challenge. Profile Album Last updated: 2009-07-28 12:00 AM
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United States
32F / 0C
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Overall Rank = 1058/5845
Age Group = F40-44
Age Group Rank = 28/403
Disclaimer: This is a long race report! 450 miles of training and 26.2 deserve some talking about!
Got to the expo on Saturday afternoon and basically just picked up my packet with timing chip (no zip ties were included-more on this later). Lots of nervous energy, so I didn't want to hang around too long, but I did stop by Bart Yasso's booth as he was signing his new book and got a picture with him. I told him that I had cursed him about 4 or 5 times doing 800 repeats over the past 3 months and he got a laugh out of that. Drove the course and glad that I did. This was the site of my first marathon back in 1999 and I didn't remember much except feeling like the last 3 miles were endless. I would not be surprised by those rolling hills. Had a nice pasta meal with chicken breast at Il Fornaio with my cousin Mark, who it turns out was trying to BQ on his first marathon. Great food that would have been even better with a nice Italian white wine, but we passed and drank lots of water. I had spent about 30 minutes trying to attach the timing chip to my shoe back at the hotel by tying it through the holes in the plastic, but every configuration really hurt my foot when I tried it on. I asked him what the best method was, he said, didn't they give you the zip ties? HUH? So, when I got back to the room I spent a good 15 minutes looking for the zip ties, didn't find any, and then decided to pull a macgyver and used 4 strands of dental floss and a safety pin...I figured that would work and it did!
Woke up at 3:30 and had my normal 2 slices of Milton's multigrain with peanut butter, a banana and some hot tea. Bus was coming at 5:00 and would leave at 5:15. 5:00 and still no success with the bathroom. 5:05 said forget it, I'll do it at the race site...ran back into the room to charge my cell phone and I got the feeling! YAY! I had been so nervous! At this point I knew it was going to be a great day! :) Unfortunately only one bus came to our hotel, and there were a bunch of us standing waiting for another to come. The Holiday Inn across the street had about 5 buses lined up so I asked anyone if they wanted to check if they had room for us. Two guys came, they had lots of room so I waved everyone over and off we went! Another sign that today was going to be a great day!
At race site, 20 min before start, ate one gu and half a banana, took off my sweats and handed in my bag. BRRRRR! I decided to do a few loops of a parking lot to see if I could regain feeling in my feet. As I was doing this I realized I had left my prescription sunglasses in the sweat bag because it was dark, I totally forgot to switch. Dork. Oh well, had to run with my dumb clear glasses and it was not so fun as they kept slipping but not so bad since the sun really didn't peek out until the last 2 miles for me.