This morning I completed my seventh marathon, with my third running of the Marine Corps Marathon.

I wish I could say I loved it as much as the first two times. I did still have a good time, but it felt a bit rougher than I would have liked. Perhaps I was still riding high from my fabulous Wineglass Marathon last month thinking I might have a repeat performance …

Anyway, I carpooled with two friends — my regular training buddies — so it was nice having company for the ride and pre-race waiting. We had a bit of a wait at the Metro, so we didn’t have as much downtime before the race than I’ve had in the past. Still plenty of time to hit the port-o-pots and check our bags before the race start, though.

We had a tough time getting to a good spot in the corrals — we were looking for under 4:30 and preferably a little faster. It got quite crowded, but we managed to find a spot. Of course we hopped the fence and then noticed a break just a few feet ahead. D’oh!

It wasn’t long once we got settled, though. Suddenly, we were off!

The three of us stuck together for the first few miles, but K (running her first marathon!) and I were pulling ahead. We tried to keep M in our sights, but eventually lost him. We did speed up a bit, but we had started slow, partly due to the crowd.

I felt myself fading a bit earlier than I would have liked, possibly as early as mile 12, but I hung in there. But eventually, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to keep it up. Around mile 15, the 4:15 pacer caught up to us and I told K to go ahead if she wanted to. I kept them in sight for a mile or so, but then let my pace slow a little. I also started walking through water stops.

I was chugging along, not feeling too badly … and then we hit the bridge. Suddenly, my right knee started locking up — and my knees haven’t bothered me at all this training cycle! I blame DC. I was just reading through my MCM 2010 posts, and I had the exact same knee pain!

Anyway … there were a lot more walk breaks after that point. While the knee did feel better, I still lost my motivation. And when I met up with my Striders coaches for pretzels around mile 23, I told them I had lost my will to live. Yeah, I was pretty done.

I kinda fell apart. Oh well.

So maybe eight events/races in the last 10 weeks was a bit much.  (I think I skipped a few write-ups here. I haven’t written about last weekend’s 50-mile bike ride yet, either.  Was that not the right way to taper for a marathon? 🙂 ) My body and mind (running is mostly mental, yes?) were a bit too tired to power through this one. (My friend, K, ran an amazing first marathon and finished in 4:13!)

Not my best time. Not my best MCM. But I’m still happy I eked out a sub-4:30!

It wasn’t my day, but it’s still an amazing race. I love MCM, but may take a break from it next year … TBD 🙂

I first participated in the Baltimore Running Festival in 2005 as a member of the four-person marathon relay. After a few years away, I returned for another relay in 2010, and ran the full marathon last year.

While I’m a big fan of this event, I didn’t completely love the full marathon last year. The merge with the half marathon walkers was so discouraging, and the second half of the race was so rough …

Still, I couldn’t stay away. I just stuck to that latter half of the course this year, taking on the half marathon.

Going into this race, I had run the full marathon and the 3rd and 4th legs of the full marathon, so I was quite familiar with the back half of this course.

The first three miles are exclusive to the half marathon course, but after that it follows the full marathon to the end.

I didn’t really have a time goal for the race. Considering the hills, I figured I’d be happy with a 2:05-2:10 half marathon. When we started, it was pretty congested which certainly kept me from going out too fast. At times I kind of wanted to speed up, but also didn’t want to overdo it. This technically should have been a marathon training run rather than a race!

I was fully enjoying myself, hills and all. I tried to just keep running comfortably, and take advantage of the downhills!

The miles were flying by, and once we got to mile 10 (and the end of the hills), I really took off. While I wasn’t trying for it, I thought I might actually be able to finish under two hours.

But alas …

Actually, I think it’s pretty awesome that I finished in exactly two hours. And on that course, I’m quite happy with that time!

I really should have been closer to my initial 2:05-2:10 guess based on my splits. I wasn’t running fast enough until the end … now that’s a strong finish!

I had a great time!

I haven’t figured out next year’s race schedule yet, but I’ll most likely be back. The thought did cross my mind to give the full marathon another chance … but we’ll see 🙂

Last Sunday I ran my running club’s longest race, 26.2K / 16.3 miles. It’s small (less than 200 runners!), and very low-key (no shirts or medals), but it only costs $3 for pre-registered club members! It’s always been one of my favorite local races. Even though it’s only 10 miles from my house, it feels like a world away. We run by farms and fields, passing sheep, cows and horses. I just love it and look forward to it every year.

We aren’t, however, always blessed with good race-day weather. It seems it’s often one of the first cold(ish) days of the year, and often rainy. This year? It was a chilly 45* at the start, with 60% chance of rain. Well, we got through about 40% of the race before it started raining 🙂

So it was cold. And it was wet. And — oh yes — it was hilly.

I was only one week out from the Wineglass Marathon, but I felt really good, hills and all. I was running with friends which kept it fun, and we stuck together for the first 12 miles or so. We split up at a water stop — one wanted to keep moving, I took a quick pit stop to refill my water and have a couple orange slices, and the third took a longer break / walk break.

I did catch up with the speedy one two miles later and we finished together. I meant for this to be a moderately-paced training run rather than a race … but it turns out this was my fastest time for this race (and distance) by five minutes!

Despite the “gentle rolling hills,” we actually kept a pretty even pace. The 10:13 mile was my pit stop (which came after one of the biggest hills, 9:50).  I’m pleasantly surprised with my pace at the mile 14-15 incline. I guess I was recovering at mile 16 when the hills stopped, but I managed to finish strong!

Yup, still one of my favorite races. I’ll be back again next year!

Last weekend I ran my sixth marathon — the Wineglass Marathon in Corning, NY!

This race had been on my wishlist for a while. I went to college in Western New York, and we had to drive though the  area to get there. When I heard there was a group of runners from my town chartering a bus to drive up for the weekend, I immediately joined in. It was perfect — all the logistics and hotel were taken care of. All I had to do was pay and hop on the bus!

I knew how beautiful this part of New York was — and the course did not disappoint. We started in Bath, NY and traveled on rural roads, enjoying farms, mountains and small towns on our way mostly downhill to Corning.

If you look at the elevation chart on the official website, it looks like an extremely downhill course! But it was actually a lot more gentle and less noticeable. The hills were few and far between. It was a very enjoyable course!

I decided to run with a pace group. It made me a little bit nervous — my marathon PR was 4:22:22 in 2010, and my pace group choices were 4:10 or 4:25. Nothing in between! 4:10 seemed a little ambitious, but I was confident that if I was having a good day, a 9:33 average pace was definitely possible. If I had to slow down and leave the group, I’d be OK with that … but fortunately, there was not an issue!

It was perfect running weather. Cloudy and 45* at the start —  just a touch chilly until we started moving.  My pacer was from Baltimore, and I actually ran with his group for part of the Baltimore 10-miler in June! I really enjoy running with pace groups. Takes the pressure off (no Garmin-watching to keep my own pace!), and it’s nice having someone to chat with — both the pacer and other runners sharing the same goal. We had a handful of other runners in our group for much of the race, but as the miles counted down we kept getting smaller. It was sad when one woman dropped off around mile 23 after she got a calf cramp. She would have had a BQ if she stuck with us!

Up to the halfway point, the miles were flying by. I hit my usual slump after 16 or 17 miles where I want to stop, but I hung in there. Had to stay with the pacer!

And a little later, maybe 19 or 20, again I wanted to slow down or walk. Nope, I don’t have to do that. Stay with the pacer! He started pulling ahead of me a tiny bit around 22 or 23, but I hung in there.

The miles kept ticking by … and then I could see the bridge. The finish wasn’t far behind!

We came in about a minute under goal, giving me over a 13-minute PR. Wow!

Post race, there was an amazing spread. In addition to the usual bagels and bananas, they has chocolate milk, cookies, chicken noodle soup, and pizza!

I had some food, stretched a bit, and then walked over to the YMCA where our bus was parked. I didn’t have to bag check since all my gear was on the bus, and they let us shower at the Y. That felt great!

Once all of our runners finished and showered, the bus headed home. Always tough to have a road trip immediately after a race, but it was nice that somebody else was driving! We had plenty of room on the bus, too, most of us had empty seats next to us. Room to stretch!

A very long, fantastic day.

Chip time: 4:09:07
Age group: 63/139
Overall: 811/1586

This was a great race. Beautiful scenery, great support at the aid stations, and a nice fast course. I loved it!