Forums >Running 101>Question about Marathons, the wall, and the pace that gets you there.
On My Horse
"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies with in us." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
A Saucy Wench
I have become Death, the destroyer of electronic gadgets
"When I got too tired to run anymore I just pretended I wasnt tired and kept running anyway" - dd, age 7
Is your log right in that you've never raced farther than a 3200m? OK basically - the faster you go the higher percentage of calories burned are from glycogen (carbohydrate stores in your muscle). If you train slower, you burn more fat for fuel than if you train faster. If you are going out too fast and crashing that hard you may have run out of glycogen. If you go out slower during the race you burn a little less glycogen and a little more fat every mile than if you go out too fast and you will last longer. Proper fueling also helps i.e. I can run 18+ miles in a training run with no carb intake with no problem because I will usually run 9:45-10:15 pace. In the marathon I ran 8:30 pace, but I did ingest gu.
Imminent Catastrophe
"Able to function despite imminent catastrophe"
"To obtain the air that angels breathe you must come to Tahoe"--Mark Twain
"The most common question from potential entrants is 'I do not know if I can do this' to which I usually answer, 'that's the whole point'.--Paul Charteris, Tarawera Ultramarathon RD.
√ Javelina Jundred Jalloween 2015
Cruel Jewel 50 mile May 2016
Western States 100 June 2016
What makes this even a little bit crazier, a few weeks ago, I did an 18 miler and closed the last two miles in like 14:30, with the last mile right around 7 flat. The pace for that run was overall faster than this one, but the pace through 16 miles was slower.
Runners run
It very well may be I just hit the wall at 17 miles and have to jog in, but if that is the case, I want to get there as fast as possible.
DWARP Marathon Madness Mob
BTW, "the wall". You went from 7:30s to somewhere around 9:00s in the second run and it came on suddenly. Yup, you were tired. But my personal experience with the glycogen-depletion wall is going from 8:00 miles to something like 11s with walking mixed in. And then sitting down.
Not for me. It has always been 7's then several high 8's and 9's before the 11's and the walking. If you'd given him another mile or two there would have been some 11's with walking then sitting. Is my guess anyway.
Why is it sideways?
Dave
I ran a mile and I liked it, liked it, liked it. dgb2n@yahoo.com