Marine Corps Marathon - RunMarathon

The Howitzer went off with an ear crushing BANG and we started to walk forward to the start line. I was running with my new friend Jacob who was looking at going a 3:30 in his first marathon. My plan was to walk 30" each mile and walk the aid stations taking in a good 8oz of Powerade each station, they were about 2 miles apart. I was carrying my water bottle, that I had been sipping on all morning and was almost empty at the start, and had 1 flask with 6 oz of Banana HammerGel mixed with 4 oz of water. I planned on taking a hit every 30-45 minutes on that. (It looks good on paper!) We hit the first mile at 8:08, this included walking or slowly jogging at the start with the crowds. We were running at about a 7:30 pace at that point. The next couple miles included a couple steep hills. Mile 2 was a 7:55 and my HR was about 165 at this point. I know Jacob is feeling good at this point because he is trained AND tapered. My taper consisted of a 6 hr drive the day before but I hadn't trained so I guess that was a good taper. I mentioned that we might want to slow down a little or we, meaning I, were going to pay for it later. Mile 3 was a 7:28, good thing we slowed down! Mile four had a long downhill and I was looking forward to my HR recovering a bit. Jacob is flying by people and as I come up beside him I asked him what his Garmin was getting for a pace right now. He responded with 5:45!! Needless to say my HR didn't recover much! Finished mile 4 at a 7:13. So we're pretty much right on pace for that 3:30! I figured that he wasn't listening to me about slowing down so I'll stay with him for a few more miles then let him go on his own. Miles 5-8 were 7:31, 7:36, 7:52 and 7:35 and I was starting to tire a bit as my HR was creeping into the 160's as an avg. I was getting to the point where I needed a porta-john so I used that as my way of letting Jacob go run his race and wished him luck and said I'll see him at the finish. As I was doing my thing on the potty I looked at my watch and noticed that I was still at an 8:00 avg pace for that mile. Holy crap!! I wiped, grabbed my water bottle and finished mile 9 at 8:15 with a dump!! Impressive! Miles 10-12 I met up with a few different people that were running their first marathon and chatted while splitting 7:49, 8:05 and 7:49. I was liking this pace much better and hit the 1/2 marathon mark at a 1:43. Miles 13-16 were 7:59, 7:58, 8:07 and 7:55. The next couple miles I started to feel my IT band a bit. With my long run of 13 miles a few weeks before I figured that the last 10 miles might be a challenge. Miles 17-19 were tough and I had a nice little discussion with my IT band. I thought we had a nice agreement worked out that if I walked a little longer at each mile and backed off the pace he (or she) would back off on the pain. The splits for those 3 miles were 8:00, 8:20 and 7:48. At mile 20 my IT band seemed to break our little agreement and decided to just plain hurt whether I walked or ran. Mile 20 was an 8:32 with about a 1:00 walk and mile 21 was a 9:50 with a lot of walking. I saw the grim reaper ringing his bell on the wall going over the bridge and started to crack up. My IT band was killing even walking so I picked a spot and started to run. I shortened my strides and just leaned forward and kept my feet moving. 5 miles left! I can do anything for 5 frickin' miles! My legs felt fine, my lungs felt fine, I had energy, it was just my IT band that was killing. As I went through the aid station around mile 22 one of the Marines said I looked good. I thanked him for all he does for the country and told him that I must be a good faker because I'm hurting! Now I started to think of the wounded vets that I'm raising money for and realized that I'm complaining about this annoying little piece of connective tissue that's causing me pain when there are heroes out here on hand cycles that have no legs! TALK ABOUT PERSPECTIVE!! Mile 22 - 8:36, mile 23 - 8:39. As I was heading out to the turnaround in Crystal City I say Jacob. He was still running, looking a little worn but still running. I picked up the pace a little to see if I might catch up to him and came up on a couple Navy girls. As I caught up to them I notices the flow of traffic going wide around them, then I saw why. The classic marathon SHART! Brown soup running right down into her shoes. As I passed by I tried to encourage her by saying that there was only a couple miles left and if it makes you feel any better I know exactly how you feel! (In my case there was a porta john 100 yds before the finish but I would have sharted if it wasn't there!) Mile 24 - 7:57, I was able to pick it up a bit but I paid for it. I walked a few times over the next couple miles and miles 25 and 26 were 8:17 and 9:00 before I was able to head up the hill to the finish. I saw Jacob and he finished at 3:33 and change. I congratulated him on a great race, got my medal and my picture taken and wandered around for a bit.

Train more seems to be the theme of this years "What would you do differently" questions. In this particular race I should have backed off in the first 9 miles and stuck with my 8:00 mile plan. I think I may have avoided the IT band issues if I had not gone out so fast in the beginning.

I headed back over to the charity village and got what seemed to be a 30 or so minute massage. It was great having massage therapists right in the team tent with no lines and no waiting. I ate a bunch of pizza, subs and stayed well hydrated to get ready for the drive home.


Training.......again.


This is a must do race to any marathoner. You cannot be around this many service men and women and not feel proud to be an American. My thanks to Toni who is the Team Hope for the Warriors Captain for getting me into the race and also to all of the service men who have given everything to keep us safe on our homeland!