Notes
Wow, this was something. On Tuesday evening, I went out to Emily Huestis' campaign afterparty and just had one double whiskey. I started to feel some congestion in my nose and thought it was from the drink, but it turns out it was the beginning of what the family has been dealing with. That morning I had woken up extra early to get in the final tune up workout (3mi at M pace), and it probably should have been one that I just slept in and tried to squeeze somewhere into the day. Not a crucial workout at all. So I was totally sick Wednesday and Thursday. Harsh post nasal drip, body fatigue, and congestion. Felt just terrible. I ran one mile on Wednesday and 1.5ish on Thursday in the 8.5-9' range. Both days just felt like total junk. Resting HR was in the 80s for a chunk of this time period and my 9 minute pace runs I was nearly at 150bpm. Yikes. On top of this, work was insane with grand opening coming up and I had some important fundraising calls to make even though I had taken sick days. But I probably pulled in a pretty big grant with my stuffed up nostrils :x)! Woke up Friday which was travel day for Indy and did a morning shakeout. Didn't feel great yet, massive headache, but I could tell despite all that that my legs were pretty poppy and ready to roll. Thought maybe one more decent night I could be on the tail end of this. Had the race been Friday insteady of Saturday things would not have been OK but I did have some time on my side. I knew I would have to be extra careful because travel can take a toll, too.
Felt half decent waking up race morning at 5:45. OK. Phew. Had a bagel, apple, and some coffee, pretty much all I could take. Drove in; things are taking just a bit longer than I had hoped and the crowds were making bathroom take much longer. Say goodbye to the girls after a short prayer. Mary started doing leg swings after seeing me do them. Jen told me that I run for the girls, not despite them. It would turn out that in miles 24 on that the image of Mary doing leg swings just like her dad helped me get through the end of the race.
Got to the corral a bit late and was probably 50m behind the 3:15 pace flag. I wasn't sweating that at all because I did not want to go out hard. I had a very chill attitude and was going to be content to just run--not race--this thing if that's what it came down to.
Gun goes off and I am buried in people. I run 7:04 first mile, feeling very good, but can't go faster. And that's OK. Don't need to. I have learned so much just from watching other people to know that an early 7' mile beats doing 8+ at the end of the race. Everyone runs too fast anyway and by mile 2 despite being far back I am already running 6:40 pace. I decide I am going to sit at this pace for a while. Hey, that's 2:55. Wouldn't be a bad day. This was only further confirmed by seeing the 3:00 pace group up ahead running like total fools hitting mid 6:30s-40s through the first 10kish. I don't think I passed the 3 hr group til maybe 7 miles.
Rolled through 10k mat in mid 42 feeling as chill as can be; I am doing the math in my head, thinking that 42.5*4=170 minutes...that's 2:50 plus 2k to go on top. So I am on 2:58 pace I think. I remember by the time we were getting to about mile 8 I needed to start pushing just every so slightly harder. Still didn't want to do too much. And I knew I was banking tons of miles to this point without cracking even much at all into the 160bpm HR range; originally I had wanted to try to average 168bpm over the race and knew I would have to be around 160bpm early on.
That's when I took it down to low 6:30s for the next seven miles and it wouldn't be until mile 16 that I hit a 6:42. Passing through midway in 1:27:07 I was pretty encouraged; there's 2:54! And the clock was reading 1:28, so I finally figured out that I started to run a full minute behind the clock. I am still passing people like crazy. Anyway, then it was back down to high 6:20s through 20mi. My 20 mile split was 2:12:xx. So I remember thinking a 40 minute 10k gets me 2:52-3. Nice for starting out at 2:58 pace! I would say that it was only until about mile 20 that I wasn't passing tons of people. Still making progress and getting by folks, but not in swaths like before.
The last 5k hurt like a total bitch. All of a sudden HR is jumping and lactic acid is just pouring in. Crowd energy is about all that is getting me through. The girls were right around mile 26 but I didn't see them :(. I finished and realized I was going to hit a low 2:54. At the time I thought this was an NYC qualifyer (turns out that that is 2:53 but that's OK. I will be there someday somehow). Regardless, I was so happy to pull this out after such a rough week. Promptly sat down and had a White Claw, lol.