Empire State Marathon - run till you're sick

Long time lurker, only occasional poster. I hope to contribute more!

Race information

• What? Empire State Marathon
• When? October 9, 2016
• Website? empirestatemarathon.com

Goals

Goal	Description	Completed?
A	<3:10	No
B	<3:15	Yes

Training

My training was all over the place this year. I kept a good base throughout the year after running the Austin Marathon in Feb, but definitely didn't follow anything specific or anything religiously.

Longest run was 22 miles in the bad humidity and heat of Boston. Peak mileage only hit 55 miles. No speedwork, a little bit of tempo, but really just an unstructured training schedule leading in.

Race strategy

The Empire State Marathon is a small town race in Syracuse, NY; only 250-some runners ran the full marathon. I knew the course was flat and consisted of two major out-and-backs, so the strategy was to run slow - maybe 7:20s or so - in the beginning and keep increasing the pace every few miles.

I didn't really follow this plan.

Pre-race

Woke up around 5AM to get ready for the 8AM gun. Coffee, bagel, bathroom. Uneventful for the most part. Scoped out the scene, moved close to the front of the corral, listened to the anthem, got the Garmin ready.

Miles [1] to [6]

6:58, 6:58, 7:02, 7:05, 6:54, 6:48

The race begins with both marathoners and half marathoners running the first 6 miles or so together. The first mile and a half go along a pretty desolate strip of road before getting to a very pretty lakeside path. I got on the shoulder of a guy gunning for a 1:30 marathon and chatted with him for the duration of this segment (big mistake).

At mile 6, the two races split and I said goodbye to my new bud, who unwittingly paced me into some real trouble. I could guess what was to come down the stretch, but I arrogantly rolled the dice.

New plan: Slow down at some point over the next six miles.

Miles [7] to [13]

6:56, 7:03, 6:58, 6:53, 6:54, 6:59, 7:19 Through half marathon at 1:31:36

Whoops.

Still chowing down the miles faster than planned. The race began to get very lonely, with five or six marathon runners ahead of me and the rest of them somewhere behind. I look around, saw a Drumpf sign on a lawn, thought about politics awhile, considered the beautiful foliage of upstate New York, and contemplated kicking that damn Drumpf sign over on my way back through this leg of the course. Passed two marathoners, and finally began to apply the brakes at mile 13. Too little, too late. The gods of the long run had by this point noticed my petulant attitude, and were triangulating upon my position to exact payment. That time I banked came as always with a steep interest rate.

Miles [14] to [20]

7:13, 7:18, 7:24, 7:17, 7:22, 7:37, 7:51

Finally dropping down a gear to something resembling my planned MP, I began the next segment of the course, which wound back through the middle-back parade of half marathoners towards another foliage-lined trail. Contrary to what was advertised, the course is not pancake-flat. The course went up a couple of bridges through mile 15 and 16, which weren't bad, but definitely noticed.

I had been noticing that getting Gu and Gatorade/water down was harder than usual. I kept having these weird hacking coughs, and could feel something like mucus in my chest when I would try to breathe after getting nutrition down. This would remain an issue all through the race. This segment was even more lonely than the last, with very few spectators and fellow runners nearby.

I had been slowing down to save something for the final 10K, but my body was sending me distress signals. I was slowing down more than I wanted to, and I couldn't seem to pick up my stride and pace.

As I passed a runner suffering through a case of the bonks, I tried to give him a thumbs up. But by then, I could feel the payment being extracted from my legs. By mile 20, the gods had found me and they would make clear their unhappiness with me.

Miles [21] to [26.2]

7:51, 7:41, 8:08, 9:00, 8:16, 8:45, 8:47, 7:28 (for .2)

Welcome to hell. http://imgur.com/NZyuguI (Me trudging through mile 26)

I took another Gu, nearly coughing up my lungs, around mile 20. Though it wasn't a particularly cold day, the wind took a toll on my body, and I felt cold and out of sorts for most of the race. I thought about taking another Gu near mile 24, but then realized I was out of aid stations.

I could feel the wall coming fast at me. Doing some foggy math, I figured that sub-3:10 was pretty much out of the question. I couldn't quite calculate whether sub-3:15 was still in play, so I made up a new goal: don't walk.

Made an excuse to stop at a porta at mile 23, and kept churning the legs through the last 5K. I never did walk, but by mile 26, I was in a rough way.

The last stretch is a mile long return to the start over that same desolate stretch of road. Nothing to distract myself with. I was bonking out hard and seeing stars.

Coughing and hacking but trying to keep my stride clean, I turned the corner to look for the finishing chute. For a brief second, I couldn't find it and felt a truly dark sort of despair grip my heart. As soon as my fizzling sight found it, I found whatever drop of gas I had left to burn and tried to kick through the finish.

Post-race

3:14:49. Good for about an 8 minute PR, though that's not saying much.

I got through the finish, sat down, and promptly fell on my back. I whipped off my singlet and tried not to pass out.

http://imgur.com/EkZUDBy

Though I knew I was okay, hunger and exhaustion confused my senses. I could hardly move. I staggered over to the bagel and bananas and tried to eat something. I housed the free beer that I was entitled to and began to feel better.

During the car ride back, I began to shiver uncontrollably and couldn't keep warm. My girlfriend turned up the heat, the seat warmer, made me put on a couple of sweaters, but for two hours, the fever wouldn't break.

On Monday, I could hardly stand, and had to sleep all day and shiver off the bad stretches of chills and fever. I'm feeling much better today, but certainly not 100%. As someone who tends to recover quickly from a hard effort, this was surprising and demoralizing.

But, hey, I nabbed a PR. And I know I ran to my limit.

What's next?

I'd like to try for a BQ next year. I think if I follow a decent plan, get my mileage up, and actually do some hard workouts, I can cut down to that 3:05 range. I have a 50 miler that I'm planning to walk/jog in November. After that, I plan to do a bit of core work in the gym, hit up a good plan that ups my mileage, and train through what I presume will be another miserable Boston winter.

On another note, I've been enjoying so much reading about everyone's exploits here throughout the year. Y'all are fast and good company even to us lurkers. Thanks for everything!

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