Notes
This was my 2nd Chicago Marathon in a row with Team World Vision. Stayed out by O'Hare and had to ride the train in to the start in the morning. Left the hotel with Adam at about 5:00 AM. Things went smoothly getting there, but the walk from the train stop to the charity tent was over a mile and the tent was about a 1/2 mile from the start corral. Drank water and ate a banana and bagel before leaving the hotel. Starting in the corral was nice, it was crowded to get into it, but we crossed the start line in about 4 minutes and were up to pace with no problems right away. It was about 60 F at the start and I noticed I was sweating hard before mile 2. I ran with Adam through about mile 7 or so and then I went ahead while he fell back. Drank Powerade from my waterbelt through about mile 9 or so and then I switched to using the aid stations. I drank Gatorade at the aid stations until about mile 23 or so when I started drinking water. Stopped to pee on a tree in Lincoln Park at about mile 5 or so. My garmin got messed up going through the underpass at the start so the intervals are not right, but we were holding pretty good between about 8:40 to 8:55 for the first 8 or so miles. After the first half of the course when it turns to the west, you could really notice the temps start to warm up and the sun began to beat down. I still felt pretty good through about mile 20 when my calves started to get very heavy and slightly cramped. I ran until about 22.5 when I started to walk some. I would walk some and then run some, trying to run for at least 3-4 minutes at a time. With about 0.75 miles to go, I was able to run the rest of the way. Things went pretty good for most of the race and I was able to feed off of teh great crowd support, but at about mile 18 I put my iPod on to try to distract me. This worked somewhat. Also, I zoned out for a lot of the later portions of the race adn I don't remember much about the scenery. I never saw Cellular Field even though we ran right past it. I am dissappointed I could not get this done under 4 hours, but I did give it a good effort. I need to push harder through the end miles of hte race. I was hurting, but looking back I wontder I I could have skipped one more walk break to make the time difference. Felt pretty good afterward, definitlely better than last year. Quite a bit of soreness for the 2 days after the race. As much as I love Chicago, I think I want to experience a new marathon next year and I will probably skip Chicago for another race.
Split Time of day Time Diff Min/mile Miles/h
05K 08:02:22AM 00:27:34 27:34 08:53 6.77
10K 08:29:52AM 00:55:04 27:30 08:52 6.78
15K 08:56:26AM 01:21:38 26:34 08:33 7.02
20K 09:23:37AM 01:48:49 27:11 08:45 6.86
HALF 09:29:36AM 01:54:49 06:00 08:48 6.82
25K 09:50:46AM 02:15:58 21:09 08:44 6.88
30K 10:18:27AM 02:43:39 27:41 08:55 6.73
35K 10:47:31AM 03:12:43 29:04 09:22 6.41
40K 11:21:19AM 03:46:32 33:49 10:53 5.52
Finish 11:35:13AM 04:00:26 13:54 10:12 5.89