An ongoing joke between my wife and I had been that I wanted to sign up for my first marathon. I racked my brain to think of a pl ace I would like to do it, and really make it special. The joke was that by this point in my running career I had already completed 5 50k’s and a few where the mileage was well into 38-40. After completing a ½ marathon last year I decided I liked to run on trail and I liked to run for many hours. I didn’t see the need to run a marathon. Until this year, I had a plan, and a part of that plan was to race every distance from 0-50k.
I decided on the endurance society’s marathon 1/2 sauer 1/2 kraut. A marathon in a park I had run before and a looped one. The race would take place at Penny Pack Park right outside of Philadelphia in a beautiful area. I had no fears about running in this place, I knew the park and I loved running there. This is the same park where I have run two Dirty German 50k’s, so I wanted worried. I had my goal and now I had to start training for it.
I started training like anyone else that is attacking their goals, I did my research. I looked through the maps online; I visited the site to see what the terrain looked like, and even ran some marathon distances as practice for the real thing. I got the lay of the land pretty easy, it was going to be on the running path of the park and not through the woods like the other races I have completed here. It would be very different. There were a few hills, but nothing to vicious to worry about, the path was mainly wooded over, so the sun wasn’t going to be a big issue, and the aids stations were only a few miles apart from each other so I could always rely on them if need be.
As far as my running and training was concerned. I went back to my old tried and true training plan. I spent four days running and two days at the gym. To start with I went off slow, I had just come off my training plan for the Ultra Spartan race and needed to get back into it slowly. I started with just 3 miles, then worked my days up to doing comfortably 9 miles. I stayed at nine miles for about a week of training and then started to toss in a really long run on the weekends; sometimes up to 15 miles. My gym time was spent working on hill training and lower body. Every day was something to make the legs stronger and swimming. I mentioned this before, I find swimming to be my biggest secret for running far. Plus it’s a great way to get off your feet for a bit, but still work pretty hard at something related to endurance.
The day of the race I was a little bit thrown off, I thought it was the normal start line for the other German endurance races I had competed in before. I ate my normal orange and HoneyStinger waffle and went to the starting line. It was 7:30 in the morning and I could already feel the temperature heating up, the index for the day said it was supposed to read 87 by noon, and I had no interest in being on the course at that time. No one had really started to line up, so I went to use the portajohn before the race one more time after a long pull of my Gatorade. The line was misery and it took longer than thought, my new starting position was almost at the very back of the pack.
After they counted down in German, we were off. The beginning of any race is the same, adrenaline rushes as fast of possible, but then starts to wane off when you realize you have so much more race to go. After the first mile of trying to make my headway to the front of the pack, I started to drop my gears a bit to slow it down. I still had 25 miles to go, and I wasn’t going to burn myself out in the first loop. I dropped to run with a group of people that looked like decent runners and kept their pace. At the time, my TomTom was functioning properly and showed I was running at a 10 minute pace, normally I’d say this was ok, but this was a marathon on pavement not a 50k on the trails, I needed to pick it up drastically. I sped up to my marathon pace of eight minutes and less for the first couple of miles. I was now alone. I don’t say that sadly, no, no, I like running alone in the beginning.
Right around mile eight the path opened up to a place I remembered from the Dirty German, the start point and into the woods I had run so many times before. The adrenaline kicked back in and I was flying under a seven minute pace! I love these trails, seeing the log I jumped over a few months before, the place I always stop to pee during my second loop. It made me smile so I was on cloud nine running it out. During the next aid station, roughly mile 9, shit started to go wrong. I trained with my TomTom throughout the summer and before to train for the marathon, so I continued to use it now…then it stopped. It disconnected from the satellite it was reading from and dropped my pace. My 7.3 minute pace was now 12 minute, and there’s just no way that was right.
From mile nine to the end I did not know my pace, nor my time, nor if I was on pace to finish my first ever marathon under four hours.
Have you ever felt just so let down? This was just like, the worst feeling I could feel at the ½ way point. I almost stopped and just left with my half marathon medal. I was so mad and disappointed in a watch that, up until this point, had only shut down three other times during long runs. At the half I asked my time, did some quick math, and continued on the path back onto the marathon. This was where my training would either make or break me.
Miles 13-17 I dropped my gears back down to roughly 9 maybe 10 minute pace. I wanted to have enough in the tank for the last push at the end, and I knew miles 14-16 were in the woods. I wouldn’t need to sprint through them, just wanted to go through in a decent pace on the hills that were hiding. My legs were great throughout the woods and through the hills; hill sprints on the treadmill were a godsend. The last six miles were tougher, the heat was now at least 83 if not hotter, and I was running out of hydration.
Small interjection, I have only just learned about heat training this year. Get up and run through the heat to get your body used to it. I felt like death at these last few miles, heat training makes it so this doesn’t happen. I have continued heat training throughout the summer and have hated every piece of it. I will be ready next time though…heat training is important.
As the race was finishing up for me, I would feel this pull I always feel at the end of any ultra, the finish line was maybe a mile away and I was that close to finishing. One of the running guides I read said you should save something in the tank for that last mile, because your body basically pulls you to the finish. This wasn’t any different. I wanted to be done, that was the motivation I was going with, not the excitement of running my first marathon. I finish my “first” marathon in under 4 hours and was pleased with the feeling.
Reflection:
Due to the malfunction of TomTom, I bought a new watch, a Garmin…they are tried and true. I will be posting my personal review of the watch at a later time, highlighting the pro’s and con’s and the VS a TomTom runner.
Heat training is a must. Train the terrain of your race in the conditions on your race. The people who run the badwater135 run in heat, hot heat all the time, it would be dangerous to go into it as if you are flying blind on a rocket cycle.
Continue the plan. I decided after this race that it was just a practice race for a 50k I had coming up. I plan on continuing the marathon running plan I have as of right now, I want to get faster and come back next year and win my age group…for all purposes, I was only 10 minutes from the first place in my age, and as this was my first marathon, I am sure I will catch him next time!
#honeystinger #TomTom #GarminVivo3 #badwater135 #dadsontherun #1/2sauer1/2krautmarathon