National Marathon - my race in review

I'm still alive and kicking after today National Marathon. It was really cold at the start, somewhere in the mid-30's and the wind was blowing, but the sky was clear and we enjoyed a beautiful sunrise.

So how'd I do? Here's the good, the bad and the ugly of the race. It was a slow start with the first mile taking 8:46, that's the trouble of running in a crowd. No wonder I felt like it was a comfortable pace. The second mile was my first "mistake," I knew I'd have to pick up the pace to gain those 46 seconds back, only I overcooked it and knocked 41 one of them off in the next mile. It wasn't fatal and I settled in at a pace slightly ahead of my goal pace of 8:00. The first half went great as I hooked up with the Naval Academy pacers for a 3:30 finish.

They took us through the half a little faster than I would have liked but I was feeling great and it was a new PR for a half-marathon (I think it was about 1:42:40 I'll know for sure when the results are posted). I was looking forward to the GU that would be available at the half. I planned to grab one to eat at this point and another to take at mile 17. As normal I slid over to the aid station to grab a drink and some GU but there were only two people handing out GU and they were the first two people at the aid station, I missed it! OK, I thought I would just dope up on Gatorade to help out and on I went.

By mile seventeen I was getting a little sore and tired, but that's to be expected, so I walked through the aid station to make sure I got enough Gatorade. That set me back about 30 yards from the pace team, not a problem. At mile 20 I was still ahead of goal pace, but the lack of GU was starting to get to me, as was the wind that was funneling down the river and right into our faces, I not sure how hard it was blowing but blowing it most certainly was.

I grabbed some GU at mile 20, there was no way I was going to miss it this time, but by now I was a good quarter mile out of touch of the pace team and I had hit, not the wall, at least not if its made of bricks, but something more like a big marshmallow that I had to run through. I could still run but it was an effort and now it was just me. By mile 21 I knew I wasn't going to get a 3:30, but that was OK. Between the wind, running by myself as opposed to a group and no GU at 13.1, I was happy to still be going at a nice clip and knew that pending disaster I'd still have a PR.

Just short of mile 26 I took a short walk break but then I heard a booming voice behind me, "Blue shirt, get your ass moving!" It was the 3:35 pacer from the Naval Academy, another runner came by tapped me on the shoulder and off we went, a dash for the finish, could we get in under 3:35? Officially I don't know if that happened but the time by my stopwatch was 3:34:54, so I made it by six seconds.

I would have liked to have run a little faster and apart from a couple of blips I might well have done so. I'm really happy about my finish today, I ran a good, no, a great race for me.
My other bonus, I didn't have to stop to pee during this marathon!!!

Comments

[Brian and Jan]

Nice job, Neil! I think you did better than good, considering the GU mix-up and the wind. Jan and I are thrilled for you! We wish that you could've meade it up for Twin Cities, but will take the summer race as a consolation.