Well, if I can pull out a learning experience from this race report — other than swearing I’ll never run another marathon again — I’ll be a wise man, indeed.
Pre-race, everything went perfectly. Pasta dinner with Jonathan Tabar and Cristina and David, their toddler (with whom I delighted in bobbing our chests up and down for an hour) in Battery Park City.
Then a Staten Island Ferry at 8:30 pm — because I had realized that even though I lived in Westchester County, it would be better to spend the night ON Staten Island rather than catch my assigned 5:45 ferry on Sunday morning. and then wait to run 4 hours later.
Air BNB was great, but I would not recommend the room I stayed (in a 3-room suite, sharing bathroom and dirty kitchen with 2 strangers) for any purpose other than pre-race bedtime at 8:45 (with turning back the clocks), and lock the door; with a host that had no AirBNB track record, it was almost prohibitively creepy.
Planned my time perfectly: up at 6:45 (even with 2 a.m. insomnia, got 8 1/2 to 9 hours sleep!); bullet-proof style coffee (only needed and received a coffee maker, so could avoid that kitchen…), apple sauce with protein powder (“not everyone gets home-made apple sauce” my wife Rachel pointed out), and waited at 7:45 for a car service that came at 8. Arrived at Fort Wadsworth Park by 8:20, and in the corral well before 9, when it closed off. Clothing was perfect as well: the sweat suit I haven’t worn for at least 5 years and a Westchester Triathlon sweatshirt from training buddy Alan Golds to throw away as we left the corral; arm warmers made of tube socks to throw away as well; Ironman hat for good luck and street cred; tank top from Team Challenge (for Crohn’s and Colitiis Foundation, for which I raised my charity entry fee, in honor of my younger son).
And the race start went as planned, as well: meeting two guys from different parts of North Carolina and introducing them; nice talk with a quiet guy from Germany; people from everywhere, pumped up but quiet. The goal was to complete the race in 3:30 — to qualify for Boston — and it did not seem like hubris, because last year I did my first marathon in 3:31, albeit on a flatter course. So, I’m not chasing anyone except that 8:00 minute mile.
First two miles were fine — “up hill” for the first 3/4 mile on the Verrazano Bridge ramp, but really not steep, and then down it, staying in heart rate zone 2 (ok,it should have been Z1, but it felt fine, easy, relaxed, a surprisingly good 8:27 going uphill and thrilling to do 7:28 on the downhill mile), but then I am in the middle of Z3 (151-161) and I think I must be picking up someone else’s monitor. I feel great, I shout out to the handful of quiet spectators, “Hey, make some noise!”, and I’m doing 8:07, 7:52, 8:16, it’s a decent average, but I am concerned about the high HR, so I take water breaks on the even miles, and I’m slowing down, but still within shooting range if I have some extra juice in the tank at mile 20-26.
But after mile 8, I’m not feeling so well. That abdominal/groin injury that set me back 4 weeks before this race is aching, and I’m trying various tricks to make it go away. I’m sipping my flasks of diluted (deluded?) gels with BCAA and salt tablet every 2 miles, but I’m slowing, slowing, and decide OK this is not going to be PR, I will slow down and enjoy the amazing energy of 5 boroughs of ecstatic fans.
But I slow down, and I am not feeling any better, and I’m still averaging in Z3 (later, Coach Debi agrees, “if you slowed down any further, you’d be walking”), and despite the energy of the crowd, I am not having fun. By mile 14, I’m ready to quit. (Afterwards, Debi said, “well, you live in New York. You could have taken a subway home, and you didn’t. That’s pretty good.” To which I answered, “I thought about it, but realized that I didn’t have a Metrocard or any cash on me…”) And now I’m breaking at every mile’s water stop. And a bathroom break. And willing my self to get to mile 18 in order to face the demons that popped up at The Wall in my prior marathon, but I am dying for any excuse to stop. Salt with caffeine tablets at miles 14, 19, maybe 23, to fight the cramps rotating through my calves, hamstrings, hips, shoulders… Even one of my feet cramps up, while I’m running! It ain’t fair!
And I see people I know! That solo drummer, with the wiry muscled arms and big big aviator glasses, why that looks like, OMG, “Art! You’re Art Lillard!” and he doesn’t recognize me, but I played in his big band 20 years ago; and a woman on my left side at mile 16 shouts out my name (I’m sorry, I was in a fog, but thank you); and THERE’s RACHEL at mile 18, and I give her a big sweaty kiss and hug her in that sheepskin coat; and Rob Martzen from Team NRGY yells at me from the other side of the road at mile 19 (it’s only 19?! doing the math; I’m not going to break 4 hours …); and Ken Fuirst at mile 20, as he promised, and Dave and Colleen Hamburger at 21, Rachel again at 22 (a much more falling on her for the hug, and I can’t speak, and forget to hand over to her my hat, which feels oh so heavy). But despite these good wishes and the crowd! The Crowd! I don’t get the burst of energy I need.
And you know it’s bad when the runners in costumes pass you. First some gladiator; then the skeleton; a guy with a big Afro; Superman in a tutu; and finally “Here comes the Statue of Liberty!”
A second bathroom break.
Central Park finally arrives, and the “uphill” everyone warned me about is really nothing, but I’m wiped out and I finish at an inglorious 4:13:10. And it’s OK not to meet a goal or to not have fun, but to have NEITHER, well, that’s a bad race.
I’m okay for a few minutes, get my swag bag of nutrition, but then I’m dizzy and I get someone to walk me to the medical tent (walk, because I’m too cramped to lie down or sit on the truck that’s offered) and I know I’m doing badly because I don’t have the energy to make a joke or ask the guy his name or where he’s from (I’m acting “out of character” as my father-in-law would say about his pediatric patients). All they can do is offer me salt, and I already took a tablet while walking to the tent, and I can’t sit down on a cot, it hurts too much, but after a while I can sit in a chair and when I feel well enough to borrow a phone to call Rachel (because she deserves not to see my like this) I know I’m ready to go.
So, what went wrong? Coach Debi and cousin Rob Falk thought I was fighting a cold or something, because a high heart rate and a sluggish pace indicates that “something’s going on”. Sure enough, my glands felt swollen after the race, and Rachel reminds me how wiped out I was on Friday night after work. And orange juice tasted better than draft beer. (Can you imagine?!) But I had felt fine and relaxed the day before, so I’m not sure what I could have done differently.
Frankly, I don’t think I trained enough. I had thought that I would build off my Ironman in mid-August, but I didn’t realize that I would have to recover, not just for one week of resting, but after another 2 weeks of building up again. So, I had 6 weeks from Ironman Mt. Tremblant to Westchester Triathlon (an Olympic distance race), and 5 weeks later this Marathon. So I really had 9 weeks to train “from scratch” for a marathon, interrupted by another tri, and further interrupted during Week 5 or 6, trying to recover from that abdominal injury (which incurred on an interval workout where I was hitting sub-8 minute miles – ironic, because it made me think that success was truly possible). So I didn’t get in more than one or two long runs. So my bottom line: too many races = not enough recovery and training.
Right now, I feel like swearing off all marathons. Maybe I’ll stick to triathlons. They’re easier!
Or maybe with the passage of time I’ll get back on the horse. Just got an email invitation for the NJ Marathon on May 1, 2016; and last year I registered for next year’s Gran Fondo NY; and the NYC Tri just opened up…
In any event, the off season begins NOW.