Slowest. Marathon. Ever.
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During the week, I was worried that the weather would be really hot and humid, but we got the warm temps on SATURDAY and race day was overcast, with temps dropping through the day and a wind off the water. Perfect marathon weather!.
My plan was to go out and try to hold a MAF HR as long as I could. In the corrals (I was in the last corral) I set up with the 2:45 half-marathon pace group, (12:35), and I figured that would keep me in MAF (or close) for quite awhile.. Unfortunately they were tracking around 12:05 pace for the first couple of miles. So I just backed off to run my race.
I was pretty quickly out of MAF HR, but holding steady in the low-mid 130s and felt really good. I just kept plodding away at a steady pace, and waited for the wheels to blow off. While there was no spectacular melt-down
, the fatigue in my legs built up until they were pretty beat up around 18 miles. I did a bit of walking to try and stretch, then went into a 5/1 walk run pace. The fatigue was simply a lack of run durability. Not enough long runs on asphalt. However
, the strength training to date really paid off allowing me to rally and finish pretty well for a slow, but acceptable time. My Garmin had me in at 5:42, and clock time of 5:48 included a couple of potty stops, where I had to wait for a bit.
Lessons learned:
- More time on asphalt. Going to make 1/2 my long runs on hard surfaces
- More time at stand-up desk. Simply being vertical will help
- More consistency with long runs
It’s full-on IM training now. It’s going to be good to get out on the bike again for consistent riding. And more consistent swimming, instead of just recovery pace efforts once a week.
Next up:
- Farmlands (metric century) – 6 May
- Brooklyn 1/2 Marathon – 20 May
- Nav-e-sink-or-Swim – 28 May