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Wineglass Marathon - RunMarathon


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Corning, New York
United States
40F / 4C
Sunny
Total Time = 3h 05m 16s
Overall Rank = 27/547
Age Group = M25-29
Age Group Rank = 4/24
Pre-race routine:

Slept less than I would have liked. Ate a bagel with peanut butter and banana for breakfast and sipped gatorade over the course of the morning.
Event warmup:

Jogged for a half mile or so in my warmup clothes, trying to gauge the weather. It was 31 degrees an hour before the start, and I planned on short sleeves for the race. I questioned that for a moment, but ultimately decided to stick with the plan (with gloves and a hat of course).

I did some static stretching, as usual. No pickups today.


Run
  • 3h 05m 16s
  • 26.2 miles
  • 07m 04s  min/mile
Comments:

I spent a lot of time trying to decide how fast I would run this. I would certainly go faster than 3:10, in order to get to Boston. My 15K speed would predict a 3:00 marathon, so I thought about going for that. But, since I didn't get very many long runs in I decided to compromise and go for 3:05. That would give me a buffer for Boston, and if I felt awesome I could try to negative split the second half.

My eating and drinking strategy was simple: alternate water and gatorade at the aid stations, and down a GU every 4 miles through mile 20. This would give me more Calories than I actually need, but I knew my stomach could handle it so why not. I carried 4 GUs in my hands, planning to pick up a Power Gel from an aid station. That plan worked just fine. In fact I stupidly gave away one of my GUs to someone who looked really bad. I was like "do you need this?" and he took it and went "sure, I got some of my own, but I'll take yours too." So I had to make adjustments after that. Anyway, I never got any cramps from drinking too much, and I never hit the wall, so it was a good nutrition strategy.

I normally go out fast, but I wanted to be conservative at first, so I put myself in a pack at the beginning and just kind of took it easy for a few miles. I spotted a triathlete in the pack, and of course I had to beat him, so I was content to follow him in the pack for a while to size him up. After the 5K mark I saw that my pace was reasonable and I hadn't started too fast, so I decided to run off the front of the pack. After about another mile, the triathlete surged to catch up with me, and we had a little bit of a competition in which he would surge ahead to drop me and then I would slowly reel him in. This was repeated a few times until we reached a hill at mile 5. His breathing was labored, so I pushed a little bit on the hill to try to break him. It's cruel, I know, but it's okay because he decided not to bite and instead let me run away. I dropped lots of people on that hill and spent the next 5 miles running alone.

At mile 9 or 10 some guy passed me, though he didn't get far ahead of me. I decided to pace off of him, because he was doing about the same pace as me. Actually he was faster on the flats, but whenever a little hill came I could catch up to him and even pass him briefly, so we had this yo-yo thing going on. Another guy caught up to me and decided to run DIRECTLY behind me. So, the three of us ran in a row for the next 8 or 9 miles. Actually in mile 12 the lead guy started pushing the pace and it became faster than what I was comfortable with. I mean, I could keep up, but it was so fast that I was starting to get worried about what would happen in the later miles. The guy behind me felt the same way. We went through the half marathon mark in 1:30:41, just a little slower than 3-hour pace and 2 minutes faster than I had planned. I kept about 5 yards between myself and the lead guy, so he almost sneaked away a few times.

Finally in the 17th mile the pace lightened up. The guy behind me said he was hanging on for dear life, and I agreed. It turns out that the lead guy just ate a Power Gel and it wasn't agreeing with him so he slowed a bit. In the 18th mile I was feeling pretty good, and the pace was actually a little slower than I liked (we did have a good rhythm before). So I moved to the front and decided to set the pace. It was very fun up there, but it turns out that my pace was a bit too fast for the others. I dropped them both, and I felt kinda bad about that. My pace was somewhere between 3:00 and 3:05, which was great. I was also picking off some people who had gone out too fast and were now doing very badly.

Then after 19 miles my right quad suddenly became very sore, like I strained it or something. Of course I kept running, so it became much worse. Before long the left quad started to die too. Actually it probably took a mile for them both to reach an excruciatingly painful level. It felt kind of like very bad shin splints in my quads. Needless to say, my pace slowed. The guy that previously set the pace passed me again, so I didn't need to feel guilty about him anymore (and the other guy finished in 3:08, so I don't have to feel bad about him either). I decided to try to pace off of this guy again. We went off the road at mile 20ish and entered a bike path. There was a gentle downhill when entering the path, and I thought I was going to die when I went down it because my quads hurt so much. The remaining time on the bike path I was just running from the gut, thinking only about how I had to qualify for Boston. I was still on pace to go under 3:05 at that point, so I just needed to avoid a complete meltdown.

The last 2 miles were back on the road, and here the guy ahead of me dropped me like a rock. Fortunately people weren't catching and passing me. In fact, I passed 2 more people before the end. These last miles were basically a countdown, and I finally became confident that nothing could go wrong after hitting the 40K mark. I cruised the rest of the way, finishing just a bit slower than 3:05 and qualifying for Boston for both 2009 and 2010.

Here are some splits:

5K - 20:45, 6:41/mile
10K - 42:30, 6:50/mile
15K - 1:04:27, 6:56/mile
20K - 1:25:56, 6:55/mile
25K - 1:47:13, 6:54/mile
30K - 2:09:33, 6:57/mile
35K - ??
40K - 2:55:27, 7:04/mile

And here are some laps:

Miles 1,2 - 13:31 (6:45/mile)
Miles 3,4,5 - 20:40 (6:53/mile)
Miles 6,7 - 13:55 (6:58/mile)
Miles 8,9 - 14:16 (7:08/mile)
Mile 10 - 6:52
Mile 11 - 7:04
Mile 12 - 6:46 <--start of fast section
Mile 13 - 6:56
Mile 14 - 6:54
Miles 15,16 - 13:53 (6:56/mile) <--end of fast section
Mile 17 - 7:06
Mile 18 - 7:10 <--start of pacemaking duties
Mile 19 - 7:08
Mile 20 - 7:17 <--start of quad pain
Mile 21 - 7:16
Mile 22 - 7:16
Mile 23 - 7:24 <--survival mode begins
Mile 24 - 7:29
Mile 25 - 7:36
Mile 26 - 7:30

What would you do differently?:

Nothing. My quads wore out because I didn't do enough long runs in training.

3rd place in my age group was just 2 minutes ahead of me, so I guess if my quads would have been okay I would have had a shot at beating him. That's the only negative of this race.
Post race
Warm down:

I tried to catch up to the guy ahead of me to talk to him, but he was still too quick.

I got some gatorade and went to stretch, but I couldn't sit down. My quads could support absolutely no weight, so I had to fall on the ground. Eventually I ate a good meal of pizza, soup, bananas, etc. and got a massage.

What limited your ability to perform faster:

Quads died, slowing my pace from the low 7:00s to about 7:30 over the course of the last 10K.

Event comments:

Great scenic race. Well-organized, inexpensive, and full of amenities. It's point-to-point, a fast Boston qualifier, and has plenty of mile/kilometer markers and aid stations


Profile Album


Last updated: 2008-10-07 12:00 AM
Running
03:05:16 | 26.2 miles | 07m 04s  min/mile
Age Group: 4/24
Overall: 27/547
Performance: Good
Course: Point-to-point from Bath to Corning. Mostly flat but cambered country roads.
Keeping cool Good Drinking Just right
Post race
Weight change: %
Overall: Good
Mental exertion [1-5] 5
Physical exertion [1-5] 5
Good race? Yes
Evaluation
Course challenge Too easy
Organized? Yes
Events on-time? Yes
Lots of volunteers? Yes
Plenty of drinks? Yes
Post race activities: Good
Race evaluation [1-5] 5

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2008-10-14 4:39 PM

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Expert
1238
100010010025
Denver, Colorado
Subject: Wineglass Marathon


2008-10-15 8:39 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Champion
7931
5000200050010010010010025
Sequim, Washington
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon

Great job.  You definitely look like you are in pain in the last 2 pics, but you stuck it out, PR'd and Qualified for Boston. 

And afterwards you got a massage and some pizza.    You lucked out I guess.  Since you were so kind as to offer me a discount on Bellingham pizza, I would have been very tempted to see that you didn't get any.  :P

Did you swing by school?  If I had though of it earlier I would have requested pics of those freakishly short pear trees that I have heard so much about.

2008-10-15 8:40 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Champion
7931
5000200050010010010010025
Sequim, Washington
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
How did you know that the other guy was a triathlete?
2008-10-15 9:21 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Queen BTich
12411
500050002000100100100100
,
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
So did you get a wineglass when you finished? Was there wine on the course??
2008-10-15 9:26 PM
in reply to: #1742664

Extreme Veteran
710
500100100
Wilmington, NC
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
Great job...woohoo!

So...are you doing Boston 2009??
2008-10-16 10:37 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Expert
1238
100010010025
Denver, Colorado
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
We got a little commemorative bottle of wine, but unfortunately there was none on the course. And I have my Boston registration for 2009 all filled out--I just need an envelope. Gotta get it in before those Chicago and NY finishers snatch up all the spots!

And the triathlete thing? Shaved legs, muscular upper legs and muscular upper bodies. Runners don't look like that. Cyclists tend to have less in the upper body too, in my experience.


2008-10-17 4:20 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Champion
5495
5000100100100100252525
Whizzzzzlandia
Silver member
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon

Skavoovie!!!!

How are you!?? Impressive run there, pal!

 

Congratulations on your Boston slot. Laughing

2008-10-17 9:02 PM
in reply to: #1742664

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Royal(PITA)
14270
50005000200020001001002525
West Chester, Ohio
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon

Very nice, a double BQ year.  How cool. 

Vague familiarity with that area, pretty run country.

2008-10-18 4:20 AM
in reply to: #1742664

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Expert
1238
100010010025
Denver, Colorado
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
There we go. I added my splits to the run comments and fixed the second chart so that it's more informative.
2008-10-18 7:29 AM
in reply to: #1742664

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Cycling Guru
15134
50005000500010025
Fulton, MD
Subject: RE: Wineglass Marathon
Congrats on the BQ!  Great race.  It is a tough distance to get right.
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