Countdown is Over - Disney Marathon Reveiw -

Walt Disney World Marathon – January 13, 2013. All my training led up to this.

This was my second marathon. I also ran the WDW marathon in 2011. You can read about that here.  Basically, when I ran in 2011 my goal was just to finish. And I did in 5:18:44 (a 12:09 min/mile average). During that race I also stopped to take about 67 pictures, so that significantly added to my time.

But this year, I was running to run. I knew I would PR (I mean, for heaven’s sake how could I not PR??), the only question was by how much. I had trained, running my 20+ mile runs at a 10:30 min/mile pace.  So my marathon goal time was 4:35:00. But my secret goal time was 4:30:00.

And here begins my cautionary tale of how NOT to run a marathon.

"It is hot. You will die"

The weather at Disney was unseasonably warm – highs in the upper 80s.  There were signs all over the expo warning people to CALM THE HECK DOWN and NOT TRY TO PR coz you would PROBABLY DIE, (in those exact words).

So what did I decide to do right then and there?  PR in both the Half and the Full.   Also, in a fit of complete insanity, with a little egging-on from my hubby and running friends, I decided I would attempt to run the first half of the marathon in under 2 hours, a feat I had never accomplished, even when just running a half-marathon, and definitely not in the middle of a full.

Looking back now, I see it probably wasn’t the greatest plan ever.

I got up at 3:15am in order to be in my corral by the required 5:00am. I packed as many calories in my body as I could stand (Boost drink, cheerios, bagel, cup of coffee) and headed off to my corral (C) where I chatted with new friends until the giant fireworks announced it was time to go.

Last non pain-filled smile of the day

I knew the 5:30am start time would give me a couple hours of running temps in the upper-60s, then the sun would come up and the world would burn to a crisp. So when I crossed that start line, I ran as fast as I absolutely could – which wasn’t always easy given the amount of people on the course.

My first 13.1 splits looked like this:

Mile 1 – 9:24 (get out of my way, people!)           

Mile 2 –  8:37                                                                      

Mile 3 –  8:40                                                                      

Mile 4 –  8:42                                                                      

Mile 5 –  8:52                                                                      

Mile 6 –  9: 12 (Magic Kingdom – crowds again)      

Mile 7 –  8:50

Mile 8 – 8:46

Mile 9 – 9:13

Mile 10 –8:59

Mile 11 – 9:08

Mile 12 – 9:28

Mile 13 – 8:57

So I basically kicked butt for the entire first half of the marathon. I ran faster than I ever had before. Seriously. I just kept thinking: keep it under 9:00, keep it under 9:00. I just wanted to make it to 13.1 under 2 hours.  And I did it! I left it all out there and I DID IT!!!

My half marathon time = 1:58:45 . Well under the 2 hours I was aiming for! It was awesome! It was wonderful! I was thrilled.

Then I realized I still had another 13.1 miles.

Laughing or sobbing? Hard to tell.

That was bad.

The sun had come up and the temperature was steadily climbing. I had already used up the greatest part of my mental and physical reserve.

Miles 14-18 were not pretty: 10:57, 10:14, 10:48, 11:17; 10:58

At Mile 19 I had total digestive system failure. I thank my lucky stars I was running through the Wide World of Sports complex at that time because I was able to duck into a *real* bathroom. But that mile ended up being 14:45.

Felt like death for Miles 20-25. Walk/ran the entire way: 11:20, 11:44, 11:11, 11:14, 12:15

At Mile 25, the craziest thing happened. Just when I felt sure I was doomed to walking the rest of the course and ending the race in utter failure, a guy ran by me, turned and saw my hat (my lucky cap from the Hampton Crawlin’ Crab Half)  and yelled to me, “C’mon Crawlin’ Crab, you’ve got one more mile in you! I’m not leaving anyone from Virginia behind. We’ll do it together!”

Sure enough, I picked up the pace and ran with him the entire last 1.2 miles at a 10:04 pace – a pace I hadn’t seen in 11 miles or more – with the guy yelling out encouragement and picking up stragglers the entire way.  We got separated near the end, and I looked for him after I crossed the finish line just to say thanks, but couldn’t find him. I’ll never forget him, though.  I hope I remember to pay that forward in a future race. Sometimes one sentence of encouragement can change someone's entire race.

Ice on calves after race

So my finish time was 4:31:25.  Didn’t quite break the 4:30, and I wonder if I had ran more conservatively in the first half if I would’ve been able to do it. I don’t know. Maybe next time. Although I swore there would not be a next time.  But we all knew I was lying.

Overall place: 3846/20679 (top 19%)
Gender place: 1275/10618 (top 12%)
Age Group (F 35-39): 261/1868 (top 14%)

The Perfect Storm of a Personal Best

Last Sunday I ran the Crawlin' Crab Half Marathon in Hampton, VA. I went into the race with zero expectations -- basically, I was just considering it a training run for my marathon coming up in January.

As I waited in the starting corral, I saw a running buddy and fellow Ragnarian and began to chat with him. We both agreed we were just planning to take it easy in this race -- him, because he had a marathon seven days later, me because I'm just lazy.  Both of us were looking for a 2:15-2:20 finish time.

But a bit more than two hours after that conversation I had finished the race, and had an awesome new PR (Personal Record) in my half marathon race time.  My previous Half Marathon PR had been 2:09:45 (set at the Shamrock Half Marathon in March 2011).  My new PR: 2:01:27 -- a full eight minutes off my previous best!

PRing in a race is always great, for obvious reasons. It means you've done something to make yourself stronger, faster, tougher than you've ever been before.  And although runners may set a PR for themselves in regular runs all the time, it only really counts if it is recorded in a race.

So PRing was great. But PRing by eight minutes? That's more than I thought I was capable of. Seriously. If you had asked me this time last week if I would PR in the race, I would've scoffed.

And coming close to a sub-2 hour half marathon? Not a chance.

I have toyed with setting a sub-2 hour half marathon goal for myself, but it seemed so far out of my reach that I never wanted to make the goal public.

Okay, yeah, I have fear of failure issues.  Cut me some slack.

To run a half marathon in under 2 hours means you have to run at a pace of 9:09 minute/miles.  Just to be clear, I regularly run 10:00 minute miles. A perfectly respectable pace for a 39-year-old woman.  But definitely not fast.

And definitely not close to 9:09. 

But I just ran a race with a 9:15 average. So evidently closer than I thought.

I'm not sure how I PRed and came so close breaking that elusive 2 hour half. It was a "Perfect Storm" combination  that included the following factors:

1. The course itself. It was mostly flat with no bottle-necking areas. Well organized with lots of support volunteers. And it wasn't too crowded
2. The weather.  Cloudy, in the upper 50s. A little cold standing around at the start, but awesome once the run started.  Steady drizzle at about mile 10 but honestly that didn't bother me.
3. The conversation hubby & I had the night before about a 9:09 pace. He suggested seeing how long I could hold that pace and then build from there to eventually reach my sub 2 hour goal.
4. All the Pilates and Yoga classes I've been doing lately. Okay, maybe I haven't been to that many, but I still feel like they are helping me significantly by improving my core strength.
5. The cold that had been bugging me for a few days. It wasn't a factor much during the race itself, but it had kept me off the pavement for a few days before. My legs were fresh and not-at-all tired.
6. An 8:00am start time meant I was able to get a little extra sleep and able to get more calories in my system before starting the race. Pre-race meal: donut, bagel chips, whole banana with peanut butter.  Oh, and a Red Bull chugged 30 minutes prior to start.

I leapt my first hurdle just moments into the race: no bottle-necking at the start. I'm usually in a mid-range corral with all the other somewhat slow people and it can cause a pretty slow first mile. But not this time. There was a gap, I shot through it, and never hit crowds again.

Once I saw that my first mile was a 9:10 pace, I decided I was use this race to test my husband's question about how long I could hold a pace like this. I would run as long as I could at this pace and then I would know how far from a 2 hour half I really was.  Since I had no goal for the race, I figured even if I bonked at mile 6 and had to walk a couple of miles, it was no big deal.  At least I would know how long I could hold around a 9:09.

At mile 3 I was still going strong at that pace. Mile 5, still good. Mile 8 - I was surprised but still keeping around a 9:10ish pace.

At mile 10 I was still running that pace. I realized I was going to PR. Even more, I realized I was actually within the reach of a sub 2:00. I ran harder, but at that point  harder just meant not slowing down, not getting any faster.

At mile 11 I was officially tired of running that pace. But heck, at that point, I only had 2 MILES LEFT. So I kept going, keeping the pace as best I could, although it slipped a couple of seconds per mile.

When I crossed the finish line, my Garmin told me I had run 13.27 miles in 2:01:45 – a 9:10 pace. The official clock said I ran 13.1 miles in 2:01:27 – a 9:15 pace. Although I tried, I wasn’t able to grab that elusive sub-2 hour time.

I ran as hard and as fast as I could that day. By far, it was the most significant effort I've ever put into a half marathon race. In the end, my pace averaged out to 9:15 min/mile. Close to that 9:09, but not quite enough.

But enough to get me to a big ol' honkin' PR. And to make me realize I am closer to what I thought was an unattainable goal than I ever thought possible.

Next time: 9:09.