2013 Marine Corps Marathon Recap

Howdy sports fans, it's been a while. Last Sunday, a week before turning 47, I ran my 17th marathon and 6th Marine Corps Marathon. To cut to the chase, I ran a 3:15:52. Not my fastest (4th slowest), but definitely one of the easiest.

As you may recall, my last entry was prior to the Parks Half Marathon back in September. Wait, let me flash back even further. As you may also recall, when I started my marathon training this season with XMP ( the Montgomery County Road Runner's eXperienced Marathon Program), I knew it was going to be a recovery season. I did not put much expectation on running a PR -- my goal was just to complete a marathon without injury. When I started the program, I was in a slower pace group than I was used to. Although I missed my friends in my usual pace group, I kept saying to myself "this is all part of recovery." Of course, the positive benefit of running in a new pace group was getting to meet (and in some cases, re-meet) and run with new friends. As the summer wore on, I felt stronger and stronger. Indeed, as our Tuesday evening speedwork moved from the trails and to the track, I – or rather – my body did not want to run the slower speeds. I joined up with runners in my old pace group when on the track and did speed work approaching my old times. 800m repeats close to 6 minute pace; mile and 1000m repeats at 6:20s. I even began doing my long runs at 8:00s and even 7:45s.

Although I had no trouble with the speed work, I often found myself struggling at the end of the long run to hold the 7:45 pace. Of course, I wrote that off as being totally unrelated to running too fast. Typical me.

So when Parks Half Marathon rolled around, I thought to myself that perhaps I might be back to my old speed. Perhaps I could attempt a low or sub 3 hour at Marine Corps. Parks Half was an excellent testing ground. I decided to start out at a sub-3 marathon pace (6:50) and then if I felt good pick it up half way through. This meant running with the 1:30 pace group. Easy enough, I though.

Well, sports fans, Parks Half provided me with a much needed reality check. Keeping that 6:50 pace was not such a piece of cake! It took pretty much all I had just to hold within eye sight of the 1:30 pace group. I finished in 1:30:24 (a 6:54 pace) – about 4 ½ minutes slower than when I ran Parks before running my sub 3. When I put my time in my trusty McMillan pace calculator, it predicted a 3:15 marathon – which, as it turns out, is what I was thinking I should be targeting all along. Well, that just goes to show you how important a well-placed half marathon can be in a marathon training program.

One more quick Parks anecdote before ending this rather lengthy detour and returning to Marine Corps. In the last mile, I was picking up the pace, trying to finish strong. I was passing a number of other runners. I recall passing one runner (in a green singlet) around the 13 mile mark. He did not seem to be running that hard when I passed him. Anyhow, as I was approaching the finish line, I could hear the “slap” “slap” “slap” of shoes pounding the ground just off my left shoulder as the runner in green passed me right at the finish line. Once across, he promptly doubled over and began emptying the contents of his stomach on the pavement. “Dude,” I thought, “if you wanted to beat me THAT badly…”

Fast forward to last Sunday…Much wizened after Parks, I approached Marine Corps cautiously. I did not want to blow up. I did not want to crash and burn. In other words, I did not want a repeat of last spring’s Boston Marathon. I looked to my first Rehoboth Marathon in 2010 – run at LSD pace, run easy and finish strong. So I decided that 3:15 would be my goal. This translates to a 7:27 pace. I thought this should be eminently do-able. And there was an official “Pacers” pace group for 3:15. My goal, then, was to stick with that pace group – at least to the 14th Street Bridge and see how things went.

And stick to the pace group I did. The pacer – I think his name was Tommy or maybe Dave, I don’t remember – ran with a stick with a “3:15” sign and three red and white balloons. I ran right off his shoulder most of the race. And an easy race it was, I must say. Sticking with the pacer, I rarely looked at my watch – just let the group take me along. We probably had about 15 to 20 people with us at the start. By the half, we were down to about 10 or so.

This year, Marine Corps Marathon returned to an older course by eliminating the “extra” hill going around the reservoir and reintroducing Rock Creek Park. On the one hand, this was a welcome addition. Who wants another steep climb in the early miles of a marathon? And Rock Creek is simply much more enjoyable to run through. Both because you are in Rock Creek Park and because it was an out-and-back, enabling me to see (for the first time in ages) the front runners as they were on their return leg.

On the other hand, the course director (or someone) kind of screwed up on the mileage. Around mile 8, we all noticed that our Garmins measured a 1.3 mile “mile.” My guess is that they overshot the turn-around. We all assumed, and were assured by our pacer, that eventually there would be a 0.7 mile “mile” to compensate and that at the end of the day we were running 26.2 miles. Indeed, our Garmin pace showed us running a pretty even 7:23 pace. So when we hit the half way mark at 1:39:01 (overall pace of 7:34), we didn’t think too much of it (even though my Garmin had me at about 13.3 or so). (That half time tracks for a 3:18 marathon).

Anyhow, I was feeling nice and strong as we left Haines Point and began our up and back passed the Lincoln and then Washington and then Capitol. The weather was near perfect, the crowds spectacular, and my legs were feeling good.

Quick aside on the weather. At the start it was quite chilly. I was running in shorts and t-shirt and running hat. I draped myself in dry cleaning bags at the start to stay warm and had a pair of my sons old sweat socks on my hands as gloves – I figured I would discard them as I warmed up as the race progressed. And although my torso did warm up, my hands never did. I wore those socks on my hands the entire race!!

Another aside – what is the number one cardinal “No No” of marathon racing? Don’t try anything new on race day. Yours truly, sports fans, tried not one but two new things on race day! First, I had run out of chocolate GU during training. Instead of replacing it at my local running store (RnJ), I figured I would buy it at the Expo. Of course, by the time we hit the expo – late in the afternoon the day before the marathon – they were all out! Jordana suggested the only other alternative – chocolate flavored Cliff shots (I learned from Eagleman that I lack the coordination to run and eat the Cliff shot blocks which fuel me through the bike portion of triathlons). Without even tasting one, I bought six to use as fuel. As it turned out, this worked out OK. I am hard pressed to say whether I liked them more or less than GU, but I did not have any GI issues because of them. (Jordana got me a box of GU for my birthday).

The second “new” thing involved water. As you may recall, I ran Boston with my water belt. I decided I would run with Gatorade this time as well. But I did not want to run with a water belt and my bib belt. I have two small 4 oz water bottles with little clip on holders that fit along the water belt belt. I figured I would just attach those clips to my much much thinner bib belt. I figured I would just tighten the bib belt as much as I could bear and the water bottles would not joggle too much. I figured wrong!! Almost immediately, my bib belt loosened as much as it could go, and those two 4 oz water bottles were bouncing up and down like crazy! Crap!! I was not a half mile into a 26.2 mile race when I knew this would not work. So I undid the water bottles and stuck them in my waist band (between my skin and my UnderArmours). Not the most comfortable, but I had no other options (and I am too freaking cheap two discard perfectly good 4 oz water bottles, plus who knew if I could ever find replacements that would fit the clips?)

But I digest…By now we are running up Madison Lane towards the Capitol. I think there were about 10 of us in the pace group – some had dropped off, others had sped up. Our pace leader, Dave or Tommy or whoever, was asking us about our “stories.” Most were trying to qualify for Boston (a 40 -44 year old man needs to run a 3:15:00 or faster to qualify). I told them how I was recovering from injury and wanted to run a 3:15 to give myself a 10 minute cushion for Boston and allow me to register early. That prompted a few minutes of good-natured teasing about being the “old man” in the group, but that was just as quickly followed by comments of “not too shabby” to be a week shy of 47 and running a 3:15.

I should probably add that it was about this time when I saw what is probably my all-time favorite/funniest spectator sign. My previous favorite was "This is the worst parade ever." But this sign just made start laughing (which is not easy to do when running): "If the marathon were easy, it would be called 'your mother'." Images of Darrel Hammond doing his Sean Connery impression on the SNL Jeopardy sketched filled my head.

As we were running down Independence towards the 14th Street Bridge, our pace leader began telling us that if were feeling strong then we should start thinking about picking up the pace. He joked that even though he was our “friendly pace group leader,” he was still an asshole who would try to beat anyone in the group who was near him at the finish. We all laughed. But I did not want to be beat by him (although, he was a very nice guy and told some wonderful stories – whether true or not, they made the time fly and the miles pass by).

As we rounded onto 14th Street near the Washington Monument and headed towards the bridge, I started picking up the pace and began slowly putting distance between myself and the pace group. I try not to look back when I run (throws off the pace – I prefer to use turns as an opportunity to see the competition behind me), but I could hear our pace leader’s voice getting more and more into the distance. And I started gaining and then passing some of the members of our pace group who had split off much earlier.

When we hit the 14th Street Bridge, I was feeling really good. Whether I was actually running faster or whether it was just my perceived exertion, I did not care. By the time I hit Crystal City, I had passed most of the runners that I could remember were in the pace group. I was feeling strong and felt like I was still running faster.

At mile 24 (or 24.3 on my watch), I checked my Garmin and did some quick marathon-addled mental math. My overall pace was still 7:23 but unless there was a very “short” mile coming up, I was not going to hit a 3:15. So I picked up the pace even more. As I rounded the corner just past mile 26 that leads up the hill to the finish, I could see the clock turning 3:15. I put it into high gear and finished the marathon as strong as I ever did.

Final time: 3:15:52, 7:29 pace.

But what I was most pleased with was my second half split: 1:36:51 or 7:24 pace. That’s right, I actually ran negative splits! First time ever.

And I qualified for Boston.

But I do feel bad for the rest of the folks running in the 3:15 pace group. We never did see the “short” mile. The final distance on my Garmin read 26.54 miles (for an average pace of 7:23) but what can you do? While I know I did not run the perfect tangent and thus expect my Garmin distance to measure a little more than 26.2, it should not be THAT much. Indeed, most everyone I spoke with measured about the same over distance as well – and all noticed the long mile around mile 8. So there are a number of runners out there who probably did not meet their goal time, which is too bad.

But that is another lesson for you: it doesn’t matter what mileage your Garmin says, it only matters what the race course says. I always use manual laps triggered by the course’s mile marks. And when I am running for a goal time, I wear a pace band on my wrist to match my time with the course mile marks – I never rely on my Garmin when a goal time is on the line.

So, there you have it sports fans. My 17th marathon and 6th Marine Corps. 14th fast overall (and 5th fastest Marine Corps). Jordana pointed out that my first marathon (Marine Corps 2003) was a 3:16:17. “10 years later,” she quipped, “and you’re only 25 seconds faster !?!” I was 637th out of 23,513 finishers, 562nd out of 13,533 males, and 44th out of 1,711 in my age group. Not too shabby.

What next? Not another fall marathon. This is a recovery season and I’m not going to risk another marathon this fall. Still thinking about which spring marathon to run. As of now, I’m thinking trying to run that in the low 3’s and then either later in the spring or next fall attempt a sub-3.

In the immediate future, the turkey trot 10K in Virginia Beach, which I hope to run with Jordana and my two older cross-country running kids. Should be fun. So stay tuned, sports fans…