Portland Marathon - 2:44 - 13th place
I'm still feeling pretty good about things two days after the race is over. Although it wasn't a PR, it was my best effort in a marathon, and my best relative placing.
The rain started early in the morning and didn't stop much throughout the race. A total of 0.8" fell during the morning. It was a factor, but I'm not sure how big. I don't think a lot of people PR'ed this year. I was shooting for a top 25 finish and that's probably where I should have been. Judging by how many people I passed, a lot of people fell off the pace and crashed.
I got to the starting line just a few minutes before the race (thanks Dan, you saved me!). There looked like a lot of fast dudes, but you can never tell. One thing I knew for sure was that I wasn't going to get in oxygen debt because I haven't trained for that. I wanted 6:15-6:20s. The first mile was a stampede and I hit 6:16. Miles 2 and 3 are gradually uphill (gain of 125 feet) and I ran a 6:20 and 6:26. At this point, I was in approximately 50th-60th place and behind the female leader. I used a nice downhill back into downtown to run a 5:47 4th mile. I was feeling pretty strong and feeling confident that my rhythm was solid. Mile 5 was a flat one in 6:07 and I found myself in no-man's land this early in the race as we began a four-plus mile out and back stretch.
I (stupidly?) braved a headwind and tried to catch up to a pack and did miles 6, 7 and 8 in 6:11, 6:05 and 6:11. I passed a lot of people trying to get with a group that was moving well. Most of them weren't. We hit a turnaround and I packed up with some guys for about a mile which made things really easy. Mile 9 was 6:13, and when 2 guys passed us and moved on, I latched in with them. We rolled through miles 10 and 11 in 6:08 apiece, and then I got dropped by one of them (Yasim) and didn't get him until mile 25. At mile 9, I was in 26th place.
Mile 12 climbed up into a little trendy neighborhood. I scaled it back on the hill with a 6:19 12th mile but used a short, steep downhill onto St. Helen's Drive to hit mile 13 in 5:59. I hit 13.1 at 1:20:54 on the Garmin, but 1:21:30 on the course marking. (The Garmin had it at 26.44 miles when all was said and done).
The next 4 miles were kind of lonely along the industrial looking highway. My calves started to get tight and some doubt was entering my mind. Luckily I had great support from my family and a couple of opportunities for tonic water from them. The random strip club in between the blue collar oil plants and trucking companies also made me chuckle. Miles 14 - 16 in 6:11, 6:11 and 6:16. The big climb up to St. John's bridge wasn't all that bad - I backed off the effort and kept my breathing in control. A pack of 7 or 8 had formed in front of me at the top of the hill. Mile 17 in 6:45 up the hill. I tried to get my legs back and by mile 18 (6:05) and 19 (6:09) I was passing people who had splintered off the pack. Mile 20 took us by University of Portland and I felt great about my 20 mile split of 2:04 (my 10 mile split was 1:02, so I was keeping it even still).
Mile 20 is halfway in the marathon, they say, and my calves began to really feel like the end was near. I knew that if they cramped, it would be 7 - 8 minute miles the whole way in, even though I felt fine otherwise. Thus began the internal battle of whether to take a chance to push the pace and have the calves seize up or keep in a rhythm that enabled me to keep passing people but not blow out the calves. Every attempt to pick it up sent tingles of warning that they were about to go, so I had to keep things in check.
Despite this, I passed people all the way into the finish. The last few miles did drag on, but I managed to stay on pace and average 6:18's for the last 5 miles of the race. I had a lot of half marathoners to weave through, but they were mostly cool and moved to the side. The crowd support was great through here and really kept me going.
I crossed the finish line and felt pretty emotional. It was great to be supported by family and to tough out a good performance on a less than ideal day. It's not easy to work full time, have a family and train for a marathon. Crossing the line makes it all worth it, though. Within a minute or two of finishing, I had reunited with everyone and was thinking about how I could shave four minutes off my time and run sub-2:40. The first start will probably be increasing my 50 miles per week up to 60 or 65.
Headed to the Oregon coast in the afternoon and enjoyed the rest of the day. | 