Seattle Marathon - RunMarathon

We started in a nice pack of 4 - myself, Michael, Cathleen and her friend. Her friend happend to be tall, so I drafted behind him most of the time (he said he didn't mind). We ran like that for the first 6 miles, chatted, encouraged each other. It was working out great, we were right around the 3:20 pace - around 7:30-7:36.
After the turnaround on the I-90 bridge, Michael and I started to pull away. Both of us felt good and we started dropping 7:20 miles. We both were comfortable with the pace and kept chatting the whole way - good sign :) We ran with a really nice Marathon Maniac guy for a while who told us he was a slacker this year and only ran 8 marathons instead of his usual 20. Those people are nuts!
At this point we were passing lots of people and rarely anyone passed us since we were speeding up compared to the folks who were running even pace or slowing down.
In the back of my mind I was a little nervous about mile 18 since that's where I broke down during my last 2 marathons. 18 came, 19 came, 20 came and I still felt good and kept maintaining 7:20s.
I was looking forward to seeing Daniel at mile 21 (he kindly agreed to pace me for the last few miles). He was right at the top of the first short nasty hill at mile 21. I tucked behind him to pace and draft off him. We maintained a really good pace through nasty hill number 2. Then there was a 1/2 mile downhill into Arboretum. Downhills are my favorite of course! I sped up quite a bit and passed a whole bunch of folks. We ended up dropping a sub 7 minute mile and losing Michael at some point.
Then came the gradual uphill up Interlaken. It wasn't as bad as people painted it, or maybe I was just feeling good. We kept flying past people including another girl who was paced by a guy and was flying past people herself.
It was good to run in the familiar neighborhood. I run Interlaken, Boylston and Lakeview all the time. Finally we were out of the hills. I knew that the worst was behind us, we only had 2 miles left and I was feeling really strong still. After a flat section on Boylston, came a steep downhill on Lakeview - I used that to accelerate myself once again and we clocked another sub 7 mile. At this point I knew that I was on the way to a new PR as long as I could maintain a low-7 for the last mile and I was pretty confident that I could do it.
At mile 25, I saw another girl and we were definitely gaining on her. I ended up catching up to her right before the last little nasty uphill at mile 25.5. I passed her half way through the uphill, but then she caught back up to me at the top. We ran shoulder to shoulder for a while, then I was able to pull away. I though I got her. However, right before the entrance to the stadium - there she is again, passing me at a significantly faster speed that mine. I shouted "Way to go!" but didn't want to give in without a battle. Both of us took it up a notch and sprinted to the finish line shoulder to shoulder. She ended up beating me by 2 seconds gun time. I later found out that she came in 10th overall and 3rd in my AG which made me 11th overall and 4th in my AG. Oh well - she had those extra 2 seconds in her and I didn't. I am still super excited about my race execution and the new PR

Find one extra gear at the stadium and sprint faster to come in 10th.

I had a bunch of water and a banana, stretched a little and then headed to Cyclops for eggs benedict and bloody marys!


Nothing. Are you kidding? I was only hoping for a 3:20, but ended up with a 3:12 and a new PR. My half marathon split was 1:37, so I negative split by 2 minutes. This was definitely the strongest I've ever felt during the last miles of the marathon.


I got everything I wanted and more from this race. I wanted to BQ and boost my marathon confidence by running an even split race. I ended up setting a PR and negative splitting. Now I know I can run marathons! It's time to train for one! Boston - watch out!