To Canada and Beyond

Detroit Free Press Half Marathon
Detroit, MI
7.4 Mile Split: 1:08:23...On pace
Underwater Mile Split: 9:30...Still doing OK
Overall Time: 2:15:02 (2743/4722 OA, 1246/ F, 190/409 AG)....I blew up

Pre-Race Goal: 2:00:00 or less
Breakfast Report: Multigrain bagel w/ peanut butter, Coffee, about 8 oz Cascade Rush Gatorade
Fashion Report: FreeLove GymGirl skirt, purple Zoot SS top, coordinating black Adidas visor, and my faithful Asics GT-2110s (I did get several votes for the cutest outfit on the course. :))

Sometimes things are just not meant to be but all you can do is learn from the experience and move on. I had set the bar pretty high for my first half marathon and my longest run ever. Coming off a successful tri season, I was the fittest I had ever been in years and feeling very strong during training and I still have no doubts that I have a sub-2 hour HM in me. Just not today.

We had flown in on Thursday night amid the storm of the season. Tornados, wind, rain. You name it. West MI saw it. Miraculously, our flight took off from Minneapolis and landed in Kalamazoo on-time, just as the winds whipped up and the rain started pouring. The winds would remain a constant threat through the whole weekend as would the rising air temperatures. To make it more interesting, my body was staging a revolt, feeling the aftereffects of eating too much chili in the week leading up to our trip. That certainly made staying hydrated more challenging. After a leg-stretching 4-mile run and a short visit with the families on Friday, Chad and I left Nathan with the Grandma & Grandpa and headed off to Detroit for a few days to ourselves before race day.

Race morning dawned….a balmy 59 degrees (UGH!) with a steady 10-15 mph wind gusting up to 25 at times. We’d have a headwind running towards the bridge, a crosswind over the river, and a tailwind in Windsor. We get to the start line in plenty of time to use the facilities and find our corrals – Chad in corral B with the elites and other fastholes, I in corral O with the people shooting for 2 hours. After a few words from Mayor Kwame and Haile Gebrselassie who was running 10 miles for charity, they sang the Canadian and US national anthems, and we were off. It took me two minutes to cross the start mats and we wind through downtown in the predawn light. The wind seems to have died down as we run on the brick roads in front of the old Tiger stadium. I find a group of people wearing Bally pace bibs reading 1:57 so I hang with them for about two miles until I realize they were on pace for a 1:45 HM, way too fast for me so I decide to back off when the girl pacing the 2:00 group blew by me and the “1:57” folks. HUH?!? I decided to forget the pacers and run my own race. We run through Mexican town where the aroma of fresh-baked corn tortillas fills the air. Not so nice for my chili-plagued tummy but it passes quickly as we head up the ramp to the Ambassador Bridge as the rising sun peeks over the horizon. Gorgeous! I was maintaining a comfortably hard pace of about 9:15-9:20, right where I wanted to be before I planned to turn it up after the tunnel. We crossed over into Windsor marking my first ever International run and turn down the riverfront. I can’t say enough about how welcoming the citizens of Windsor were. They lined the roads and cheered their hearts out. After about two miles in Canada, a platoon of Marines running in formation and in cadence caught up with us. The cadence call gave us civilians a great lift and we were a bit bummed when the platoon had to detour to the blue thrones right before the tunnel.

Ah, the tunnel. The start of the underwater mile and unbeknownst to me, my undoing. I entered the tunnel with about 1000 of my fellow runners and hoots and hollers echoing off the walls. This is going to be fun. Or so I thought. Who turned on the sauna? The air temperature rose about 30 degrees as you ran further into the strength-sapping tube. It was uncomfortably hot and stuffy. As I cross the line marking the border, my heart rate spiked and stayed there for a few minutes and I began to taste my breakfast again. Uh oh. This is definitely not part of the plan. I slowed to an easy jog and managed to recover the heart rate a bit just as we exited the tunnel right into a brisk 20 mph headwind. OK, now who turned on the blast chiller? Time to turn it up…or not. The combination of the heat of the tunnel followed by the chill wind made both my calves painfully seize. YEOUCH!!! I kept running albeit at a slower plod because I wasn’t sure if I could get going again if I started to walk. Sheer stubbornness got me to mile 10 when I had to give up on the “Walk/Don’t Walk” fight and kissed my goal good-bye. My legs just couldn’t go anymore. I ran/walked the last 5K, walking every aid station and for a minute every 1/3 mile or so. I turned down Woodward and helped by the cheering masses, dug down and found another gear to sail to the finish. I did it. In retrospect, after sulking about my result for a while and mulling over the day’s events, I have nothing to be ashamed of. I left everything out on the streets of Detroit. I was unprepared for the opposing conditions of the tunnel versus the outside. It was a hard fought race.



There are a few things I would do differently next time:

1. Extend the length of my taper to 2 weeks and run my last 11+ long run 2 weeks out and maybe do an over-distance long run about a month out
2. Don’t pick another race with such a long enclosed space
3. Lay off the chili the week prior.

It was a learning experience and as such a good race.

Now it’s time for a short unfocused *off-season* before I start base for next year. I still have a score to settle with this distance. Bring it on!

Life in the Fast Lane

Detroit Free Press Marathon
Detroit, MI October 21, 2007

Pre-Race Goal: 3:00:00 or less
7.4 Mile Split: 48:37...18 seconds per mile too fast
Underwater Mile Split: 6:21...Wow! Too Fast
13.1 Mile Split: 1:29:54...Right on pace
17.4 Mil Split: 1:57:09 8 seconds per mile ahead of pace
20 Mile Split: 2:18:28 3 seconds per mile behind pace
Overall Time: 3:04:37 11 seconds per mile behind pace
91/3750 OA, 83/2512 M, 11/311 AG....Top 10 if you take away the Belurussian Elite

Breakfast Report: Multigrain bagel w/ peanut butter, Coffee, about 12 oz Gatorade
Fashion Report: Red and white RaceReady singlet, Red RaceReady shorts, Full Sail Brewing cyclists cap
Post-Race Libations: Labatt’s Blue (When in Detroit.... ) and an array of appetizers in Greektown.

The alarm rang loudly at 4am. Time for my pre-race warmup jog. I'd read about this in Running Times just before my Eugene BQ and decided to make it a part of my race day routine. As I headed out the door, I glanced at my watch and saw 1:15 am PDT (ouch!). A quiet 10 minute jog along the Detroit River assured me that the day would be warm and windy. The eerie quiet of a major city at this hour was quite calming however and I returned to the hotel room ready to eat and mentally prepare.

We rode the People Mover to the start and grabbed a spot in the potty line about 45 minutes before the start. 5 minutes later, we scoped out the starting corrals and did some light stretching. With about 30 minutes until start, I suggested that we get in the potty line again. Good call as the 5 minute wait was now a 20 minute one. We wished each other luck and I entered the B corral. Hmmm, most of these runners are wearing A's on their bibs. Evidentally, the A corral was closed to all but the wheelchair division until about a minute before the gun.

Bang. We are off. I had planned on going out with the 3:10 group for the first couple of miles since that was the fastest pace group advertised. I found three 3:00 pacers before the start, so decided to go with them instead. We hit the first mile right on pace.. Mile 2 was about 10 seconds fast. Fine. Mile 3 approaching the climb to the Ambassador Bridge was again about 10 seconds fast. Mile 4 included most of the climb up the bridge. The view of Detroit and Windsor in the predawn glow was amazing. A gust of wind blew me sideways about a foot and brought me back to reality. 6:08! That mile had to be short. We're running uphill. Mile 5 came in at 7:38. Good the markers were wrong. As we ran through Windsor, we encountered our first significant crowds of the day. The Canadians were great as they really cheered us on. The crowd upped our adrenaline as now the miles started to fly by at a pace that was closer to 2:55 than my planned 3 hour pace. When we reached the tunnel, I was glad to be out of the wind. Until the warm, still, air inside greeted us. For the first time, I was aware of just how much I was actually sweating. I had skipped the first water stop as well as the third. I began thinking that I may need to start getting some fluids at every stop.

The organizers of Detroit did learn from the mistakes of Chicago. Prerace info stated that there would be water and Gatorade about every two miles along the course. On this day with near record temperatures expected, there were water stations at almost every mile. Kudos to the race director for adding extra stops along the route.

Exiting the tunnel brought on a slight chill as the cold wind blew across my sweat drenched body. A temperature drop of about 30 degrees didn't help. I managed to keep my pace strong, but I started to feel the first affects from going out faster than planned. My prerace goal had been to cover the first 9 miles in 63 minutes and then make up the lost time on the flatter, faster second half of the course. Instead, I reached mile 9 more than a minute ahead of sub 3 hour pace. At mile 10, my legs were already screaming and I began to realize that the pain was not going to go away over the remaining 16 miles. This was going to be tough. Miles 11 and 12 were uneventful as we ran back past Tiger Stadium for a second time. The half marathoners split off and headed to the finish area. I still had a long way to go. As I approached the halfway marker, I decided that I couldn't put off a potty stop any longer. The blue boxes were stationed on the sidewalk, behind the spectators. As I headed off course to relief, people in the crowd tried to stop me and redirect me back into the road. PLEASE people! I have to pee! The stop cost me some time as I gave back all of my 90 second cushion and crossed the halfway mat dead on 3 hour pace.

The next mile may have been the cruelest on the course. The crowds disappeared and we ran down towards the riverfront and the full force of the wind. We also passed within a half block of my hotel. I was VERY tempted to step off the course and walk to the finish area in time to see Raquel finish the half. I knew that I would never forgive myself for dropping out of a race when I wasn't injured, so I turned away from downtown and headed north towards Belle Isle. I continued to run within a second or two per mile of my 3 hour pace. A tail wind along this stretch helped as I was not feeling strong. My stomach was getting sloshy and I knew I would have to skip some water stops to give it time to absorb what was already in it. I did manage to pour a cup of water over my head to keep cool under the building heat.

Entering Belle Isle meant climbing another small bridge. It probably wasn't more than a 20 foot elevation change, but it felt like a mountain. Belle Isle itself was very scenic, situated in the middle of the Detroit River and including some grand old buildings. The island was closed to traffic and this meant no crowds to cheer us on except for the water station. Doubt began to creep in as I began to reassess my goals and decided to seek anything better than my old PR of 3:08. A sub 3:05 would be a great day. I didn't realize that I was still ahead of 3 hour pace, but I knew that I couldn't hold this pace for 9 more miles anyway. Mile 17, entering the island, was my last 6:xx minute mile of the day.

The next few miles off the island were run through the Indian Village neighborhood. The homes here would rival those of any great city and the streets offered the first shade since the canyons of downtown 8 miles ago. I was able to drink again, and started to walk through the aid stations. I both wanted to rest my screaming legs and make sure that I took in as much water as possible. I knew that I was somewhat dehydrated, but I also knew that my stomach could only absorb so much liquid right now. As we left Indian Village, just before mile 23, we turned back towards downtown. The rest of the race would be run into a 20 mph headwind. I alternated passing the same slowed runners near me following each water station, only to be passed by them as I walked through the next one. Around mile 24, my lower back started to seize up and I had to walk while trying to massage the muscles loose again. I can only assume that this was due to leaning into the wind while running as well as dehydration. After about a minute or so, I was able to run again and soon caught up with the same group of runners. I decided to skip the final two water stops and simply keep moving forward at my 7:45 per mile pace. I was no longer measuring the race in miles, only minutes left to run. At mile 25, I knew I only had about 10 minutes left to run. There was no way I could reach 3:00, but I could still hang on for something less than 3:05. The crowds were heavy again as we reached Greektown. And I could see the buildings surrounding the Campus Martius finish area. Just after mile 26, I could see the finish banner and decided to give whatever I had left. I felt like I was sprinting, but my watch tells me that I only managed to regain my 3 hour pace for the last .2 miles. As I crossed the line, the emcee was explaining to the crowd the significance of the next five minutes for all Boston hopefuls. With this finish, I earned the opportunity to run Boston again in 2009 should I so choose.



Oh, one more thing. I take away the kudos to the race director. The RD is sick and evil. I just ran 26.2 miles and the finisher's medal weighs half a pound (no joke, I weighed it). That's a full 5 oz heavier than the half marathon medal. It feels like it weighs about 30 pounds around my neck. Ugh.

Post-Mortem: I am much prouder of my performance in this marathon, than either of my other two. In Portland, I faded hard in the final 6 miles as I learned what the marathon is all about. Eugene represented a perfect storm of great training, perfect weather and a terrific pacing team. I didn't feel that my training leading up to Detroit was great. My tuneup races went well, but I never felt that same easy, fluid motion in the rest of my training runs that I had had leading up to Eugene. Add in the difficulties of a seven hour flight and three hour time change, as well as the warm, windy conditions and a PR was more than I should have hoped for. I am most proud of the fact that I never gave up on the race. The low points hit me earlier and harder than in either of my previous marathons, but I managed to push through. As rough as the final six miles were, I passed 18 runners while only being passed by 6. It was a hard day for everyone.