This one is something of a pre-amble to The Pain Files. Training for the Bucks County Marathon was repeat notification that something wasn't right with how I was feeling, but I just ignored the signs. As for a Race Report - the Bucks County Trail Marathon has been held the same day as the Philadelphia Marathon and is a much-less crowded and nice alternative to that event (mostly-even and firm crushed cinder surface, virtually no hills execpt to go under road passings). This year (being 2012) they took a couple of late additions, to accommodate displaced runners from the cancelled New York Marathon (cancelled due to hurricane Sandy). I think my only complaint from the race was that the aid stations where I asked for Gu didn't have any, and they didn't know which table/aid stop did. I somehow missed it on the outbound and inbound passes. I should have known better than to rely on race-provided nutrition anyway. No one seems to get this right (in my opinion) outside of Ironman. Oh, and I left the FB comments in since I think they help provide a little more context.
Experiments in Marathon Training
by Sue (Notes) on Sunday, November 18, 2012 at 7:30pm
6 Marathons and the training leading up to them.
1. Philadelphia, Nov 2004, 5:20:43.
- Signed up with Team in Training (Leukemia and Lymphoma Society), so had “coaching”.
- Memory says training was 3-6 mi 4-5 x/week, plus 1 long run on w/e, 9 min pace group.
- Got stress fracture on 11 mi run with the group (turned out to be my longest training run prior to race day).
- Continued cardio and strength training via pool running and in-line skating.
- Race day plan – quit at the half and consider my obligation met.
- Race day – Intervals of 3 min 15 sec run and walking (I have no idea how I settled on this interval…). Felt good so went past the half point, and finished event.
2. Philadelphia, Nov 2008, 5:35:29 (as Chris Roberts).
- According to my notes, I did not train for this.
- I did not sign up for this, and the event was sold out.
- My dad bought a bib from another competitor, so I figured I’d quit after doing the half.
- I’m sure I did intervals. Maybe as above, or maybe shortened a bit (guessing 3 min run/walk).
3. Fargo, May 2010, 5:38:10.
- Following Beginnertriathlete.com training plan for iron distance triathlon.
- Training at that point was 30-120 min, 3 x/week, at a pace of 12 min/mi.
- Longest run before race was 10 miles.
- Race day – Intervals of 3 min run, 1 min walk. Went out much to fast (2:26:21 first half), and had the most miserable/painful finish experience to date.
(IMLP), July 2010, 6:33:43.
- By this point training was 30-180 min, 3 x/week, at a pace of 12 min/mi if I could hold it.
- Longest training run was 16 mi.
- I think I tried the same run/walk intervals as for Fargo, but they got heavily goofed up by the aid stations, which I walked regardless of which interval I was on.
- Time includes misdirection and discussion with time keeper to please not disqualify me after accidentally crossing finish line after 13 mi.
4. Chicago, Oct 2010, 5:16:49.
- Entertained following a Pfitz training program supplied by my dad, but I felt it had way too many detailed numbers (exact calculations for paces under all training conditions) and ultimately found it to confusing.
- Training was actually 41-180 min, ~3 x/week.
- Longest run was 14.6 mi.
- Suspect I did intervals, probably the same as in Fargo.
5. Berlin, Sept 2011, 5:04:06.
- Following Beginnertriathlete.com training plan for half iron distance triathlon, substituting swimming with in-line skating.
- Running was 30-120 min 3 x/week, with pace 9:15 to 12:30 min/mi.
- Longest run was 10.5 mi.
- Day before race, 26.2 mi in-line skate, 2:08:11.
- Race day – Intervals of 2 min run / 1 min walk (except aid stations, which I walked no matter what, or if I didn’t hear the timer go off).
(IMWI), Sept 2012, 5:01:54.
- Following Beginnertriathlete.com training plan for iron distance triathlon.
- Training was 20-180 min, 3 x/week, 10 min/mi pace.
- Longest training run was 18 mi.
- Race day – run continuously, except for aid stations where I grab food/fluids, or steep up-grades. First time without using set intervals.
6. Bucks Co, Nov 2012, 4:49:35.
- Following Smartcoachplus (found on Runnersworld.com), which customizes a plan based on your inputs of:
- recent race time (I picked a recent 15 k time trial training run),
- weeks before event (I had 9, but program spat out 10 weeks so I started at week 2),
- how many days per week you wanted to run (I picked 3),
- how aggressively you wanted to train (I picked moderate out of maintenance, moderate, hard, very hard)
- Training was 2-5 mi easy run, 4-6 mi tempo run, 5-18 long run per week.
- This was my first:
- running tempo at a specific pace.
- marathon run with a specific goal pace that I wasn’t sure I could maintain.
- marathon where I didn’t plan to use walking intervals.
• Race day:
I was in the 4:30 corral, and given my training pace for Wisconsin and some of my runs for this marathon (~10), it seemed a reasonable finishing window would be between that and 4:22. However, that finish would have likely left me wondering whether I could have done better by pushing the pace the training plan called for (9:14) for a predicted finish of 4:02:16.
I managed to hold that pace for 11.5-12 mi, but it took constant focus. I found some great rabbits to follow which is probably why I made it so far. But I could not hold on; I finished the first half in 2:03:14 (9:22 min/mi).
The second half was exactly as miserable as I thought it would be, and I watched my hard-fought first-half average pace slip. It should have stopped getting worse as it approached the new slower pace I was running, except I guess I was continuously slowing down. At mi 20 (3:20:17 which is darn close to 10 min/mi), things got ugly. It became obvious I wouldn’t make a 4:30 finish, and in addition to being very uncomfortable, I was becoming demoralized. How could just running a marathon feel worse than doing an ironman triathlon???? I started walking, then would spot a tree and tell myself - I could only feel pathetic until I got to it, then I had to start running again. I’m not proud to say I teared up approaching the finish line, when I saw exactly how bad my finishing time was going to be, and I was sobbing by the time I got through the finishing shoot. This was not the finish I trained for.
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