How many miles did you run today?

[jbarwick]

7 miles at lunch.

 

[FlyingMonkey]

Well, that was horrible.

I did everything wrong, the weather wasn't what it was supposed to be, and I ended up with exactly the result I would have had if I had just decided to jog around like on my normal long runs.

I started off feeling good and tried to find the 3:45 finish time pacers. No luck. I thought I must be behind them so I kept on, but realised after the first check that I must be well ahead of them - I was running at just over 5:00min/km. Too fast, in other words, but I was feeling good so I persisted. This lasted until about 18km - if this was a half-marathon, I would have been quite pleased. However at this stage several things happened: firstly the clouds cleared and the sun came out. This wasn't supposed to happen. It was supposed to be rainy, cool to cold, and overcast all day. Even the race organisers had been advising two days before that it would be colder than we expected. But it wasn't, it got quite hot. A lot of people, including me, were caught out and started to overheat. Then there was the hill at halfway. Not much in normal circumstances, but 100m up in 1km of hairpins killed a lot of people. I took it easy thinking I could get back on pace at the top, but I never did. In fact it got worse, and the loop around the second lake at the top was a lot more up and down than the profile let on. I actually felt like quitting several times; I took to walking a km then running (or really jogging) two. It wasn't muscles so much as joints: my ankles, knees and hips were all very uncomfortable. At one point around 32km, the 4:00 finish time pacers caught me and I tried to get back up to speed and stuck with them for a couple of km, but I couldn't even keep that up. When the 4:15 finish time pacers passed me around 36km, I almost gave up again. But then for the last 4km, I found something and actually ran until the finish. 4:20:30 in the end. This was 35 minutes slower than my target and 20 minutes outside my pre-race estimated slowest time.

So, yes, if I had just run at a comfortable, even pace like my long training runs, I would have done better than this. And yes, it was all my own fault. I trained well and prepared meticulously, and then I abandoned all of that just because I felt good in the first 10km. Stupid. Plus I didn't even get to see Mt Fuji, because the cloud cover was so low at the places where we might have had a view. All of this meant that I really didn't enjoy the experience at all which is, at the moment, making me feel like I never want to do it again. I may just not be cut out to run marathons (or longer).

We will see.

 

[jbarwick]

@FlyingMonkey - This is what makes me not want to sign up for races. You train and have your up and down days but then on race day, something small goes wrong and derails the whole thing.

Funny thing, Nashville had its Flying Monkey Marathon this weekend which winds around the park I like to run at. It is 2,700 ft of gain and is brutal. I want to run it one day but signups are only 1 week long and it is a lottery. I need to set a reminder for it.

As for my weekend, I got in a 7 miler Saturday then 7.x miles yesterday. This was in between finishing up painting our dining room and entryway. I still have some trim to paint but really love the results.

 

[Fueco]

I ran three miles with the dogs yesterday morning. Same trails, beautiful weather (temps in the mid 40s and sunny), I'm just not motivated right now to go much farther.

 

[Fueco]

3.5 miles with the dogs at the beginning of a storm forecast to dump up to 18” of snow on us through tomorrow night. Temps in the low 30s with a steady light snow falling. There was just enough snow on the trails to make the extra treacherous.

 

[Fueco]

I think today is going to be a ski with the dogs sort of day. I might even be able to ski from my front door...

 

[Fueco]

Would you believe I ran these trails yesterday? We got 17” in the past 24 hours.

 

[FlyingMonkey]

It was my club's 5k time-trial at the track last night. I got off the train a bit further away than usual and jogged 6km at a 6min/km pace to the track, just to make sure I could still run after the weekend! I knew I wasn't going to be able to run super-fast in the TT itself: I just tried to keep a good, even pace and didn't force it. The end result was 20:37 (4:07min/km pace). I was quite pleased with that, and it made me feel a bit better after the painful first marathon experience*. I hope I'll be able to run a bit quicker in next month's TT.

*I have decided to do another marathon in June next year... it's definitely not one I'm doing for speed, as it's mostly off-road (but not hilly), but it just happens to be just down the road from a conference I have to go to the next day. At the track, a couple of guys were talking about their cupcoming 50k trail race, and I started thinking that 50k isn't all that much more than a marathon... it never stops, does it?

@Fueco, I think that's what will be waiting for us when we return to Ontario in mid-January. I'm not looking forward to it. Tokyo might have made me soft...

 

[Fueco]

3.5 miles with the dogs on a mix of plowed and unplowed sidewalks. It was slow going, but good to get out despite the treacherous conditions.

 

[FlyingMonkey]

I've seen the splits for the marathon now, and they are interesting reading, particularly because they are not quite how I remember it feeling. Apparently I went on longer at the higher pace than I thought and then basically fell off a cliff. On the day, or at least in my memory of it, it felt like I was slowing down earlier...

No 5km split
10km: 0:51:24 (this includes the 2 minutes it took to get through the start gate)
15km: 0:24:40 (way, way too fast at under 5 minutes / km)
20km: 0:25:37 (slowing a little, as I thought)
25km: 0:24:39 (but then I got way too fast again, when it felt like I was getting even slower)
30km: 0:35:09 (Boom! There I go... it probably happened at about 26-27km by the look of it)
35km: 0:40:39 (the worst section - that's over 8 min/km average, because of all the walking)
40km: 0:38:37 (again, lots of walking, although you sort of see the effect of running again by 38km).

The positive thing to take from this, is that it shows is that I can keep a 3:30 marathon pace for 27km. I just need 15km more at the same pace... easy... not! However, maybe after another 6 months of proper training, I might be able to. Whatever, I'll have fun trying.

 

[jbarwick]

6.6 miles last night. I didn't run over the Holiday as I refuse to treadmill run. There were a great couple of days but I did not bring running stuff when I did have a place and time to run. Oh well.

 

[Fueco]

I ran 3.5 with the dogs on dry pavement, ice, hard-packed snow, hard packed snow, slushy snow, and powder snow... Temps around 40.

 

[Fueco]

2.5 miles in sloppy extra-slushy snow. Not fun, as my feet were soaked within minutes. Fortunately, it was warm enough (52) that I didn't get cold...

 

[jbarwick]

7 miles last night. It was 40* which usually calls for a long sleeve and gloves in my book to be comfortable. Again, I had a hard time warming up after this run. I was warm during my run too which makes it all the more challenging on figure out what is going on.

 

[FlyingMonkey]

Took a few days off more just because I had lots of other things on than by design, but it was probably good for me. I'm in Singapore for a conference this week. It is stupidly humid here and quite hot too, even at night. I did an 8km fast run up and around the Botanical Gardens this morning, looking for any hills I could zip up and down (I have a mountain race coming up on Sunday back in Japan). It was great but I was absolutely dripping when I got back to the hotel.