Madison Mini-Marathon and arbitrary numbers

Yesterday I laced up for the Madison Mini-Marathon.  I'm not very good at tapering.  Really, there is no tapering that exists for me.  I get to the long run and then just stop running any distance over 5 miles.  It's more of a drop off.  I try to help this by doing my long run only about 2 weeks out from the race, but how much it actually helps is debatable.

After the 10 mile long run on a Sunday two weeks ago, I've only ran a 5k race, two 4 mile runs, and then a 6 mile run this past Wednesday.  I kept up with the yoga and did some biking, but made myself do no exercise whatsoever on Friday.

Yesterday morning, I got up and got on the scale and clocked in at my heaviest.  Ugh, I thought.  Recently, I've been thinking some about this number on the scale and my difficulty in letting it go.  I've gotten better at not dwelling on the number, but I still have to mentally justify that number each time I step on the scale.  Even though I feel healthy and fit, I still struggle with just letting the scale be what it is. 

Race starts at 7am, and I was supposed to meet Barry at 6am at his place to ride downtown together.  I set the alarm for 5:15, and slowly rolled out of bed.  I spent a good 10 minutes dousing myself in sunscreen, trying my best to reach my back without any help.  After digging around for running clothes, I made a cup of tea and only had about half of it before I went out the door with a granola bar in hand.  At 6:02, I was in my car on Barry's driveway.  Barry was running later than me, so I munched on my granola bar and sipped water to make sure I was well hydrated.  We got downtown about 6:25am and parked at a metered spot, deciding to risk a ticket.  Thankfully, it was easy to find a parking spot downtown despite how close it was to race start.

I don't own a running watch.  People ask sometimes how do I know how fast I'm going.  I tell that that I usually just listen to my body.  I aim to push in training and my body tells me when it's too much.  So when I formulate race strategies, it's more of a mental game and throughout the race, it's a constant loop in my head of "remember the miles to go".  For this race, I debated starting with the 2:00 group or the 2:10 group.  Since I was in Corral G, only the 2:10 pacers were in my corral, so I decided to start a bit behind them and to aim to chase down the 2:00 pacers.  Barry had plans of dropping out of the race or to walk for large chunks of the second half.  I wasn't sure what he was going to do, but I knew that running with him is always a bad idea for me.  He's like the watch that I don't need when I want to stay tuned in to how my body is feeling.  I resolve to ignore where he is when the gun goes off.

The race starts and my legs feel fatigued already, but I catch up to the 2:00 pacers pretty quickly.  At this point, I know I'm running sub-9:00 min miles to have caught up to 2:00 pacers about 2 miles in.  But I'm feeling good despite a nagging fatigue in my legs, so I maintain pace and run with the 2:00 group for a while.  I get a little bit ahead of them in anticipation of the water stops, but somewhere around mile 4, I'm feeling really good and I get pretty far ahead of the 2:00 group.  I know they're behind me, but I'm not sure where.  I walk through every water stop.  At this point, I'm resolving to not let the 2:00 group pass me until mile 8.  We get to mile 8, and my pace has slowed.  I know the distance between me and the 2:00 group is shortening when I hear spectators cheer the 2:00 pacers just as we exit the Arboretum.

Right before mile 9 marker is Cemetery Hill.  This was a daunting, daunting hill.  We went up at a sharp incline, leveled for a bit, and then went up some more.  A lot, a lot of people around me were walking at this point and I aim to just make it up the hill.  The hill took a lot out of me and not too long after, the 2:00 pacers pass me.  I keep them in sight though, and slowly recover enough to catch up to them again.  By mile 11, when we turned onto Lakeshore Path, I'm shadowing the 2:00 pacers, and there is hardly anyone around them.  Either everyone's found their legs and managing to stay well ahead of them, or they're lost the 2:00 group.  I know I've got a little bit of a cushion having started behind the 2:00 pacers, but I have no idea how much.  Knowing I'm near the end and almost done keeps my speed up.  When we get to the Memorial Union, I hear the pacers say to each other how they try to tell those in their group to hurry up ahead of them to guarantee a sub-2:00.  I wasn't expecting to have any speed left in me, but when we round that final corner, I catch up to and pass the 2:00 pacers.  I hear them say they've got 40 seconds to cross the finish and make sub-2:00 and they are right on target with their time.  The finish is downhill and I sped down that faster than I had imagined possible at that point.  I felt good despite the blister that I knew had formed around mile 10. 

1:58:47 was my final time.  Sub-2:00 was a PR that I've been chasing for about 2 years now.  I'm happy to have gotten there, but the thrill of achieving a PR is not what it used to be.  I noticed this after the Full Moon 5k.  It was a great PR, but it was mostly just another race.  We attach more importance to reaching a sub-2:00 time, but the difference between a 1:59 and a 2:02 is the same as 2:02 and 2:05.  It's just the difference between a good race day and a bad race day.  Ultimately, I'm still just a 2:00 half marathoner.  

But numbers are useful for lines in the sand and setting a goal.  I'd like to run sub-2:00's consistently and see times closer to a 1:55.  

Quad Cities Half Marathon

Final time: 2:02:12 (PR)
10k split: 56:00

A lot of this marathon reminded me of the Flying Pig.  There was a marathon and a half marathon event that started out on the same course before the half marathoners turned off somewhere before mile 9.  There was also a relay component for the marathon.  They had a Pump N' Run event, and a shorter 5k event.  The course also traversed more than one state and ran across a couple of bridges and interstates.

We drove down Saturday afternoon and picked up my race packet.  Like the Flying Pig, swag included a poster of the Quad Cities marathon, but I declined the poster.  I was trying to give my Flying Pig one away to my sister even.  The shirt didn't feel like a dri-fit shirt, though the label claims otherwise.  It was soft, and made for a nice sleep shirt.  We also got a Quad Cities bandana. I chose a blue and green one to match the colors of the marathon.

All races except the kid's race started at 7:30am on Sunday in Moline, IL.  Our hotel was only a 5 minute drive away and AWAY from the race which meant very little traffic.  It was 42 degrees at the start, though expected to warm up to 50s mid morning and low 60s by noon.  I chose a sleeveless singlet to wear along with some capris, though I suspected I'd be too warm.  I got to the start shortly before 7am and was cold standing around, so I ducked inside a building until about 7:15am.  Then I lined up with the other runners and was surrounded by body heat.

It was crowded at the start.  Unlike Flying Pig which was strictly corralled, the Quad Cities allowed runners to line up according to what their perceived pace was.  Though there were pacers with signs, I felt they were spaced much too closely together.  The 2:10 pacer was really close to the 2:00 pacer, and I was planning to start between the two.  In the end, I chose to line up with the 2:10 pacer.  I find that starting with the 2:10 group and chasing the 2:00 group has worked well for me.  I crossed the start line with 1:20 on the clock.

Capitol Mile

The Capitol Mile is put on by the Wisconsin Track Club.  You run 1.75 loops around the square for a net downhill course. They run 7 different "heats": Elite Women's, Elite Men's, Girls Youth, Boys Youth, Open Women's, Open Men's, and Masters. 

I hemmed and hawed about running this race.  I was downtown at Barrique's working when Barry stopped by around 3:30 asking if I was going to run my division of Open Women's at 4:15.  I had all my running gear in the car with me, but I couldn't decide if I felt like running a mile.  At 3:50, I decided to do it.  I grabbed my stuff, quickly changed and met him down at registration.  Because I hadn't decided to run this, I didn't plan my food intake particularly well.  I ate lunch at about 3pm, and I certainly felt it midway through the race.

There were only 7 of us in the Open Women's division.  It was incredibly small and somewhat amusing at the start when none of us wanted to be right at the starting line, asking each other if they want to be ahead.  This is very different than the Boys Youth group all jostling each other at the start line.

The last time I ran a mile and just a mile was back in high school when I was 15.  The fastest I've ever ran it then was at 8:00.  So I had no idea how to pace myself during this race.  I figured one mile, no big deal, I'll just go all out.  About 200 meters in, I'm running third in the pack and thinking to myself, "holy shit, I'm not this fast."  I pull back.  I turn a few corners and I'm climbing the hill back toward where we started.  Halfway up this hill, I hit the 1/2 mile marker and someone shouts 3:22.  Whoa, still way too fast.  And sure enough, I feel myself lose all gas at this point and some of that lunch shifting itself upwards.  The second half mile, people are passing me left and right, but I've little choice in the matter and nothing left to sprint with at the end.  I come in last.  Still, I finished it at 7:30 for a PR. 

Movin' Shoes Full Moon 5k

"Hot" black shirt.

 We were blessed with a cold spell this last week.  Temperatures dropped to the 70s during the day, and it was often cool enough at night to wish for a light jacket.  These was amazing temperatures for mid-July races.

The Full Moon 5k is put on by the Madison running shoe store, Movin' Shoes.  I've bought the last 4 pairs of running shoes there.  The shoe store puts on a number of races throughout the year including a Frosty 5k and a Elver Park 5k, but this is the first of their races that I've been to.  The race is limited to a field of 500 runners, which is plenty so that I was never alone on the course, but I also never felt crowded.  At only $20 race registration with technical shirt, blinking light and chip timing at the finish, this race is a much better choice in my opinion than the Electric Run.

The race starts at 9pm on a Thursday with packet pick-up over at Olin Park, which is actually about 3/4 mile from the start.  Barry and I parked down there, picked up our packets and t-shirts, hid from the storm cloud for about 20 minutes before we had a nice warm-up to the start.  I debated back and forth about a rain jacket.  There was a looming storm cloud that may or may not hit us, but when the rain never quite materialized before the start, I didn't bother.  It was just a bit too warm for a jacket anyway.  I did wear a hat to keep raindrops out of my eyes just in case.

By 9pm, the sun has set in Madison, and it's fairly dark.  Barry warned me of the speed bumps on the course with stories of when he tripped over one and then finished the race with blood dripping from his elbow.  The race directors provided us with blinking lights to attach to our persons, which I appreciated, but this I also left behind with the rain jacket.  It was darker than I had expected but the race directors lighted the course with blinking lights in the parts where street lights were lacking.

The course itself is beautiful.  We start on the west side of Monona Bay and run around it to Brittingham Park, cutting over to John Nolen and then back down to Olin Park for the finish.  Everybody who's ever lived in Madison knows that the drive around Monona Bay has some amazing views of the Madison Capitol and the skyline, especially at night in the summer when the bay glitters with the reflections of the lights.  The course takes us right toward and past this view.  These kinds of courses were designed as a love letter to Madison. 

Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati

The Flying Pig Marathon has some really good reviews.  And I can't disagree with what others have to say, but I do really wish my first marathon wasn't on this course. 

Cincinnati folks are big supporters of the Flying Pig marathon.  There were so many people out on the course with entertainment.  Random strangers were standing on the side of the road, in front of their businesses or their houses handing out bottles of water, gummy bears, bananas, paper towels, etc.  There was constantly someone around cheering you on.  There are water stops at EVERY mile.  I had to skip a few to avoid taking in too much fluids.  I also liked that the water stops were placed in the middle of each mile.  It helped mentally to convince myself to make it first to the next mile marker, then the water stop, then the next mile marker.  I ran the last 6 miles that way. There were even non-race sponsored live entertainment.  It's a pretty awesome race if you're not focused on time.  It's also a scenic course.  The views at the top of the hill in Eden Park give a gorgeous outlook of the river.  At one point we even cross the bridge over to Kentucky for a couple of miles.  There's a course tour on the website that I should've read before running so I could recognize some of the major landmarks. 

Unfortunately, the course is also really really hilly.  Others online have said that the major hills are from about mile 3.5 to mile 8, and then after that it's gentle rolling hills.  I would disagree with that.  The hills after are anything but gentle.  And as a first time marathoner, come mile 22, I really needed flat road or downhills to carry me to the end and not have to dig deep to find the will to tackle yet another hill.   

Mad City 50k Relay

Does it still count as a PR if it was part of a relay?  I think so.

The Mad City 100k event is three races.  There is the 100k and 50k race for the hardcore ultra marathoners.  And then there's the 50k relay.  The instructions for the relay were simple.  At least 2 members for a team, and each member must do at least a 10k.  Age brackets were calculated based on aggregate age, with someone's age twice if they run two laps.  The 100k started at 6:30am and the 50k starts at 8am.

Ear warmers as race swag for the relay runners.

Barry suggested back in February getting a team together to run the 50k relay.  He suggested Ellie as a part of our team with Ellie doing one lap and me and him each doing two laps.  But Ellie wasn't sure she'd be in town that weekend, so we asked fellow runner and trivia teammate Joe to join us and run our fifth lap.  Come the day before, Barry and I reassessed our abilities to do two laps.  I'd been sick all week after my 20 miler and Arboretum Spring Sprint and hadn't gotten any miles in because of a sore throat.  The course for all three races was my beloved Arboretum loop. I've been training on the Arboretum loop for almost all of my runs outdoors, but I've always ran it in the "wrong" direction, i.e. I run it clockwise on a map so the mile posts count down rather than up. Joe warned me that the "correct" direction feels like quite a different course and the hills more difficult.  I tried the course the "correct" way Friday morning with 20 mph wind and hail blowing in my face.  I ran it in 1 hour and 20 minutes because I had to stop and walk.  Oh boy.  Barry had ran the course on Monday in 54:01, but he felt terrible after.  Neither he nor I felt sure about a second lap.  So Friday morning, after my trial run on the course, I asked Ellie again if she wanted to take a lap since she will be in town after all.  She thought about it, looked at her schedule for work and said, "ok," if she can take the first lap that starts at 8am so she can make it to work by 10:30am.  Hooray, Barry and I thought, and decided that he and I would flip for the last lap depending on how we felt after the first one tomorrow. 

Get Lucky Triple 7k (Half Marathon)

I had low expectations time wise for this half marathon.  I had been running at least one double digit run a week for the past month, and I didn't feel like my muscles were recovered enough for this.  I laid off on the Thursday 6 mile run that I had scheduled.  I knew I needed a couple more days.  While I still didn't reach my sub-2:00 goal, it was still a PR at 2:03:25.

At last year's Get Lucky Half Marathon, the weather at the start was a beautiful 60 degrees.  This year's temperatures at the start was a cold and chilly 22 degrees Fahrenheit.  I looked at the forecast for the whole week, and it seemed for a while that with Friday's high of 41, we might get at least into the mid or upper 30s for Saturday's race.  No such luck.  Friday never quite reached that high and instead had some snow in the evening.  The forecast for Saturday now read "26 degree high, with chance of snow in the AM."  I started wondering whether I should've sold my bib and let someone else run the race.

Awesome race swag:
hoodie instead of a T-shirt.

The Get Lucky event is two races in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis.  The 7k run is a loop that starts in Minneapolis, whereas the half marathon is an out and back course that starts and ends at the Ford Plant in St. Paul. I thought it was interesting that the start of the two events were actually 7 miles apart.  It actually worked out in my favor.  I was worried that this was going to be too big a race.  The website mentioned that they usually have about 12,000 people registered for this event. The 7k had about 10,000 people registered, and the half marathon 2700.  As it was, parts of the half marathon course were kind of narrow for the amount of people.

The other nice thing about the two separate races was that parking for the half marathon was super easy and free.  While one could opt for the paid parking in the Ford Plant, parking in the local residential neighborhood streets was just as easy.  I got there at about 7:10am and only parked a block away.

It was cold.  I had on 3 layers and planned to keep them all on during the race.  I also had my hat and my gloves.  After I gear checked an extra hoodie and pair of sweats for post-race, I started my warm-up with some easy jogging.  The warm-up actually kept my spirits up as I felt less cold once I started going.  I appreciated that the start line had nice large banners for estimated min/mile pace.  I lined up right before the 9:30 mile marker.  The pace teams also came out nice and early.

I decided right from the start that I wasn't going to try and keep with the 2:00 pace group.  I wasn't trying for a PR or goal.  I just wanted a good training run.  I wanted to run a smart race, one that I'll recover easily from and still be able to do my 16 mile training run 5 days later.  I told Ellie on Friday that I'm hoping for better than my worst half marathon time of 2:10, but I'd be happy with anything less than 2:20.  Throughout the race, I kept telling myself, "smart race, smart race, not a fast race." 

Berbee Derby 2012

This is perhaps the first race for which the alarm clock inexplicably failed me.  I woke up literally a minute before my friend Barry called to tell me he was outside in the car waiting.  I told him I needed 10 minutes.  I threw on contacts and running clothes and headed out the door.  I counted on the weather being the 50+ it had been all week.  I did not count on wind.

After I crossed the finish line.

This is the 9th annual Berbee Derby.  The event happens on the morning of Thanksgiving Day and runners often don turkey hats on their heads.  I saw a couple of people dressed as M&Ms or carrots as well.  I think anything that might show up on your dinner table later that day makes for an appropriate costume.  The Berbee Derby has two events: a 5k run/walk and a 10k run.  It's an unexpectedly large event.  They were telling us at the start that there was something like 8000 runners.  I registered fairly late.  I wasn't sure I was going to do this run, and I kept procrastinating on the registration.  Come Monday, I'm down at the Copps on Fish Hatchery buying some Thanksgiving Day supply when I saw the Berbee Derby registration office.  I took that as a sign.  Half an hour later, I was registered.  They assigned me to wave B for the 10k, though I informed them to expect only a 10 min/mile pace out of me.  I wanted a workout on Thanksgiving Day, not so much a PR.  It's my first 10k race though so it's an automatic PR anyway.  As luck would have it though, this 10k is slower than the first "10k" at Lake Monona.

Madison Mini-Marathon

I just want one perfect weather, injury free half marathon.  Well, October it is.

Beautiful 50 degree weather at the start this morning for the Mini-Marathon.  Too bad, I had a bothersome ankle that now post-race is developing into an ugly bruise.  I thought about dropping out of the race at about mile 6.  I didn't want to exacerbate an injury that might prevent me from someday running a full marathon.  At mile 7, either the pain has numbed feeling in the ankle or it's subsided, but I no longer felt pain with every step.  I get in a couple of good miles and then the pain comes back in and out for the remaining race.  

Somehow, I finished, and even managed to have exactly the results I expected though not hoped for.   

Split times:
5 mile- 44:32
10 mile- 1:35:17
Last 5k- 29:29
Finish- 2:04:45
Overall pace- 9:32