Category: New York Marathon

As the NY Marathon was cancelled this year and I didn’t want to waste all that training plus I was fund-raising for Team World Vision, I decided to run the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon on November 3, 2012. The weather was around 35 degrees Fahrenheit and it was fairly crowded at the start line but as the race progressed, it really thinned out. It was definitely a weird race as they didn’t block all traffic and there were quite a few intersections where there were cops stopping traffic to let the runners through. I remember at one point, a lady was using her phone and didn’t see the cop and nearly hit him and the cop screamed, “GET OFF YOUR PHONE!”

I started with the 3:40:00 pace group but they started out a lot faster than I was planning on starting so I fell back to the 3:45:00 pace group who actually started out rather quick too. I decided to spend the first few miles just getting comfortable and finding a pace that I was comfortable with. Around mile 5 I caught up with the 3:45:00 group and then decided to keep going at a 8:15/mile clip or so. I caught up to the 3:40:00 pace group around mile 12 and ran with them through 15 before I decided to try to go faster. I was keeping a good 8:10-8:15/mile pace before mile 19 where I must have done the tangents wrong since I was 0.15 miles over and this resulted in the 3:40:00 pace group passing me. I tried to keep up but by mile 21, I hit a mini-wall and for the rest of the race I was really struggling. It didn’t really help that it started hailing/sleeting at mile 23 and started to drizzle/rain at mile 25.

At mile 25, I was in pure zombie-mode just trying to get to the finish line as it was getting cold due to the rain soaking my dri-fit running clothes. I picked up the pace but my calf muscles kept cramping up every few steps which became really frustrating. Mentally I was drained but I was trying to fight through the fatigue to just finish the race. I can definitely understand how Marathon’s can be a mental toughness game. For me, since mile 21 I was exhausted and remembering Chicago last year, around mile 16 I just basically quit, however this year, after 7 months of training I wouldn’t have any of that. I definitely did slow down after mile 21 and I took longer to restart running after each water station but overall, my pace slowed 20-30 seconds only which I was pretty happy with.

I really tried to shoot for under 3:40:00 but just couldn’t, however I was able to finish at 3:40:xx which was awesome. It was a PR of 25 minutes roughly and came out to be about a 8:25/mile which was about the pace of my training runs during the summer. Crossing that Finish Line never felt so good, haha.

Base Miles (10 weeks): 135.25 miles – 18:47:19 (8:20/mile)
Week 1: 23.56 miles – 3:08:56 (8:00/mile) | Last run: 10.02 miles – 1:21:57 (8:10/mile)

I’ve been training for the past 2.5 months and have gotten in about 135 base miles before week 1 of an 18 week training program that mixes Hal Higdon’s Intermediate Marathon training program with World Vision’s training program. Today was the last day of Week 1’s training and I ran with Team World Vision on a 10-mile long run. The weather was amazing and everyone was in high spirits since we finally got some reprieve from the scorching Midwest heat that we’ve been experiencing for several weeks now.

Having been training at about a 7:45 to 8:15/mile pace for my standard runs prior to my long-run I figured I would do around an 8:30 to 8:45/mile pace. That wasn’t the case, at all. In fact, the weather was perfect, 73 degrees or so with a cool lake breeze and I felt really good throughout the entire run. I ended up doing 10 miles at an average pace of 8:10/mile going at what I thought was a pretty easy pace (60-70%). It was a solid run for everyone and there was a great sense of running camaraderie.

The route was nice too, since having just moved to Chicago just a little over 2 months ago, I haven’t had the opportunity to try out too many routes yet. We ran to Navy Pier and then looped back and went 3 miles west of Castaways to the “Totem Pole” and back. It was pretty breezy and the waves were making some big splashes along the path which was fun and amusing.

Days like this remind me why I run and go through a pretty regimented training program in the summer to get ready for a Marathon. I love how you can run and explore different parts of Chicago and when the weather is nice, it just makes everything better! 17 More Weeks to go!