2:45 is the new 2:55

At some point in 2010, I told myself that I would try to time qualify for my next NYC Marathon rather than do a 9+1 or lottery.  I would need a 2:55 marathon to accomplish this.  And though my current PR is 3:29, with some more training, and a speed-friendly course, I really do believe I could reach that 2:55 mark.

But then NYRR lowered the time to 2:45.  Two-freakin-forty five.  What.  The. Hell.

I'm not going to get into this.  I'm just gonna let it stew in my gut for a bit.  Plus, I have other things on the calendar- goals that I seriously cannot take my eyes off of.  Like the Ironman.  And speaking of getting distracted, I've registered for the Mohawk Hudson River Marathon again this year.  My pal Mark will running it, after missing out last year due to an ankle issue.  Fellow SCBkR runner and TNT alumni, Matt, will be coming up to run it and maybe some others will join us.  Should be fun.  And I hope to PR the hell out of it.

Last weekend, while up visiting my parents, I decided to visit the Mohawk Hudson River path, one of my favorite running routes, and home to the above sited marathon.  What I got was another snowy run.

The sign that greets me, in the parking lot across from the L&M Motel.

I drove to the closest access point to the path, across from the L&M Motel, and parked.  I brought my light weight Sauccony Kinveras, but it was immediately obvious that I'd once again be wearing my Gortex lined Salomon XAComps.  Not just snow, there was a lot of ice out there.  I generally stay on this path, turning around and going back the other way rather than running through the Schenectady Stockade area, but sidewalks were clear of snow and that was a strong selling point.  Plus, I had my iPhone on me and thought it'd be nice to share some highlights of this route.

Apparently the oldest house in the city, built in the late 1700s.

After pausing for the photos, I popped out the other side (the neighborhood is like 5 blocks long) and found the rest of the path.  It was deceivingly clear for about a mile or so.  I soon encountered more snow and ice. It wasn't the fun light snow, it was crusty and icy.  It's ironic that this has been the most mild winter I can remember in NY, yet I'm tired of doing long runs in the snow.  Yes.  Ironic.  But hey, it's kind of pretty, no?

Somewhere in Niskayuna.

General Electric turbine factory.  My dad used to work there.  Until they laid him off and shipped his job across the border... to Pennsylvania.

Lock 8 on the Mohawk River, part of the Erie Canal.

For fun, I decided to do 13.1 miles.  It was kind of hard.  My legs were still recovering from the Thursday weights session and again, it was hard running on that snow and ice.  I managed to crank out an average 9:10 pace, but on the clear patches, it seemed I could hold a steady 8:30ish pace. I'm looking forward testing that this snowless Saturday.

MHRM 9-Oct-2011: Recap

It died a few blocks shy Mission Road.  My watch had a low battery to start with, but I was still hoping it would last at least until the turn around point.  I was trying to do about 18 miles from Pasadena to East LA and back, and didn't have a good sense of distance.  Sure I lived here for 5 years, but I didn't really become a runner until Brooklyn.  The weather was perfect, cool and overcast.  The route was exciting to me, tracking part of my old commute to work.  But this run was sucking.  Big time.

I'm starting this marathon race recap by mentioning this run because of the contrast.  I didn't have a great training season.  It started late because my evolution toward a midfoot strike took longer than I anticipated  I accomplished one great long run of 16 miles in Brooklyn, and this shitty 16.5 mile run in So Cal (nope, I didn't make it to 18).  I was upset at how that run turned out, but I knew from experience that it still counted.  Yes, even crappy runs count.  And now, by this mid September date, my training was wrapping up.  Because of RTB and another calf injury (caused by a big piece of ply wood and gravity- if I had a wood working blog, I'd explain further, but this is a running blog, so...) I didn't have another opportunity to run long.

So what to do?  Squeeze one in at the end anyways?  Ha, don't be silly.  Sure the thought crossed my mind, but I knew that wasn't going to help.  It was what it was.  So I tapered, gathering my strength and recovering for the race to come.

As it turned out, Mark also sustained an injury at RTB (perhaps even earlier?) that put him out of commission.  This race, the Mohawk Hudson River Marathon, was supposed to be our glory run to sub 3:00 finish times and Boston 2013.  Instead, it became a solo run for me and an experiment with effort, water and salt.  Remember this?  And then this?  And this thing I did out of frustration?  I do.  And it paid off.

Sure, I'm ready.  Let's rock.

I was pretty relaxed going into this one, it being my 5th and knowing I wasn't going to try to break land speed records.  I considered that there was a good chance I could PR this one, because the course is significantly easier than NY and I didn't plan on exploding.  But we would see. I wasn't tying myself to pace.  I was tying myself to effort level.

There were only about 1,500 runners (1,000 doing the Marathon) in this event.  Though NYC is the most glorious marathon ever, this was a welcomed change. The race started a 10 minute drive from my parent's house. And I carbo-loaded on my mom's fried chicken and rice.  Yum.  And in the morning, Mark picked us up and took me to the start of the race.  I hung out in his car to stay warm until almost the last minute and didn't bother checking any bag.  I even slept long and well the night before.

Science Series 41: Electrolytes and Me

I've never carried water on any race I've done.  I never felt I had to.  But the math that I did in my quest to be cramp-free suggested that I really should.  And to take salt more regularly as well.  I purchased this bottle with the recommendation of James and Emily who both use it and like it.  This was to be my first race with it.

I lined up at the start about 15 seconds before the gun went off (yeah, relaxed race) and took off with a full bottle.   Mark and Emily were cheering around mile 3 along with my parents and Josie.  They were able to hop around the course fairly easily by car, which was nice.  I had asked Emily to swap water bottles with me about half way through, but I didn't think I would actually need to  One bottle was likely enough, I figured, but just to be safe.

I also packed a Ziplock of salt to carry with me and dipped into it every four to five miles or so. 
 At mile 6 my request for a water refill caught Emily off guard.  She didn't have the bottle ready.  No biggie.  I had enough water to last another few miles when I would see them next.  But then I didn't see them and I went through all my water by mile 10.  I ran with an empty bottle and took water cups from the water stations for a couple miles.  But still, there was no Mark and Emily.  So at the next water station I slowed enough to refill my bottle.  It turns out it's not that hard to do.

Emily cheers.  I ask for water.

 When I saw Emily and Mark at mile 17 or so, Emily ran with me a bit to help me top off my water bottle.  I had already drank more than half of it again.  They soon passed me in the car, one of them hanging our the window beating a metal pot with a wooden spoon.  Around mile 18, they pulled over under a bridge and  the sound of their pot beating was, well, awesome.  All the runners around me loved it.

At this point I had already consumed three bottles of water.  Interesting.


Effort Level & Heart Rate
I was wearing a heart monitor that day, the other element of my experiment.  Unfortunately, I had forgotten to check my trusty Jack Daniels' Runners Formula book to see what my max heart rate should be, so I set it to 155 beats per minute (bpm) and had my watch beep at me if I surpassed it. Rather than measure my effort based on breathing or just feeling, I had the technology to do so by heart rate.I wanted to be sure my effort level remained tame and somewhat conservative for maybe 18 miles or so.  But not even a mile into the race, my watch was beeping at me.

"Damn.  I'm not going that fast.  This doesn't feel that hard."  Either I was even less trained than I thought or I had guessed wrong at my optimum heart rate race pace. After about 3 miles, I decided that the latter was the case and increased my heart rate max  alarm to 165bpm.  By mile 8, I increased it again to 167bpm because the beeping was driving me crazy and I didn't want to slow down.  Yeah, the monitor was doing its job, I just didn't want to listen.

Metal horns indicate the perfect marathon pace.

I was able to successfully hang around 165-166bpm, just avoiding the alarm, for another 8 miles or so. Just after seeing my pot banging cheer squad, I decided to switch the alarm off.  My pace wasn't increasing, but at this point in the race, my heart rate was.  In other words, it was feeling harder.  My beating heart reached into the 170s a couple times in the next few miles, but I didn't need it to tell me how hard I was working. I could feel it.

So In The End...

The mile 22 water station was run by TNT and me and my purple singlet got a huge reception.  What a great place to find a TNT cheer squad.  This marathon isn't a TNT event, but there were a few purple singlets out.  It was a perfect spot to kick it into gear and spend whatever energy I had left over.These last few miles were hard.  They always are.  But I kept pushing.  I saw my brother and Kait, who had just finished the half marathon, about 400 yards from the finish.  My family, Emily and Mark along with Paul were cheering about 200 yards from the end.  They had some killer signs.  I didn't read them because I was moving so freaking fast.  But the crowds love them as did other runners.  The local paper posted several pictures of them in their online gallery.

Family and friends out supporting me, Kait, and the other runners.

Other than a new shiny metal, I came away with a few excellent lessons learned and confirmed.

• Even crappy runs count in training.  I knew this already.  I just want to reiterate this to you, the reader/runner.
• I ended up filling my water bottle four times.  Wow.  And I salted every 4 to 5 miles.  I believe this is what I have to do to be successful in marathons where finish time is important to me.
• Following the heart monitor was a great way to stay disciplined.  It really kept me in check.  And yes, I had guessed wrong.  My proper zone for marathon pace actually reaches up to 170bpm, so I was way too conservative with my original 155bpm setting.  167bpm seemed to be perfect.  My pace was fairly even and the last mile was one of my fastest.
• My evolution to midfoot is confirmed complete.  Yeah, sure, there's always something more to learn and I welcome it.  But I can recall thinking during some runs earlier this year, "This feels horrible.  How the hell am I supposed to run a marathon like this?"  Well, I just did. It felt natural.

Oh, and my time was 3:35:something.  Not a PR, but definitely my most successful race.  That is super exciting to me.  I feel that I've figured a few things out about my running.  And I cannot wait to apply them to my next event.

I got a metal, a sign, and a kiss.  Pretty good day.