Notes
Eugene Marathon - 1st Marathon, goal was to beat Trae Richardson's debut marathon time.
Temp at start 38 and about 55+ at finish. Arrived at 6:50, later than planned and then rushed to find Trae, but I did see Tricia and Lanae on my search. Finally found Trae further up in the corral so we started together.
I beat my goal of 3:52:12 by 15 seconds, but it took an 8:19 closing mile to do it! I drank water/Gatorade at every station, but in hind sight, after weighing my self and doing some mental math, I finished the race about 6-7 pounds lighter than I started, which means dehydration could have been a big factor my final 10k fade from being right on for 3:50 ( i was feeling good this morning, and was dead on through 20 miles.) Took gels regularly and my stomach was happy. Should have drank more significantly during the middle portion of the race, especially between mile 9-18.
Trae paced me through the first 10.5 miles before peeling off to run last of the half in the 5's. We felt good and were conversational (I probably should have talked less, but it all felt easy). Terrible (meaning none) entertainment from mile 2-9, just a bunch of south Eugene hippies banging drums, pots, tambourines, and a Nancy's yogurt container (not kidding)
About a mile into Springfield, i linked up with another woman (Shannon) who was concerned about her pace as the 3:50 group was running fast and not in sight at the moment, so we ran together until 18 where she grabbed an ERC bottle and I picked up my next pacing partner, Josh. Turns out she runs with Joe's group.
Ran solid with Josh out to Owosso, passed Jen just after mile 20, she yelled at me which was nice, so i turned around to see how it was and said hi. Mile 20-21 was in the low 8's, however this is a dead zone for Garmin watches so i probably tricked myself. From 21 on is where the fatigue was starting to set in, and I was less conversational. HR from here on in was 178-180, which is certainly above my lactate threshold :-) so I knew the time until death march was slowly closing in. Josh was with me until 23, then the last 5k was solo. I was running low 9's by this point and feeling the suffering and cursing my earlier conversations with people and telling myself not to walk. The climb through Spencer's butte park was not fun. Began turning up the wick a little at EWEB and really sped up from mile 25 on. I could feel my body bonking and my calves were getting tight, but I knew i could hold on for 1200m, so i passed lots of people and cruised home in a very happy time for me.
I was surprised how quickly my body was not happy with me after stopping, like 10 seconds. I should have just kept walking to stay loose, but felt my lungs tightening up and my hip flexors/glutes/calves being not happy at all. I staggered along and grabbed a bottle of water by the chip cut-off station, wondering how everyone already seemed to have one and was drinking it. Hung around there to congratulate Shannon and anyone else i saw, then meandered for the food, more water and then out to meet my family. Very grateful for my family support out on the course and knowing where to see them along the way. Also Haley was able to provde additional gels along the route.