Well, that's over. I can only describe the race as terrible and wonderful at the same time. Terrible in that the heat was brutal, times were really bad, and it was a complete train wreck out there. Wonderful in that it was the Olympic Trials, I had many chances to quit, but didn't, and got my best placing at the Trials ever (and made my overall goal of Top 50). So definitely not the race or conditions, I would have asked for, but the outcome was good, and I feel really good about it.
I went out in the back row, and stuck near the back for the first few miles. Felt pretty good for the first lap, and was not feeling the heat. Felt like I could keep up the pace (just under 5:20/mile) the whole way without problem. Body felt good, and everything was loose.
2nd lap, still held a good pace, but everything starting crashing down around Mile 11-12, and was strongly considering dropping out when I went through the start/finish line. It just got really hot, all of sudden, and my stomach was not feeling too good.
By the looks of things, everyone got hit with the heat at the same time though, as everyone's pace dropped. We had a strong pack for the first half of the race, but it just instantly blew up around Mile 14, and I can only describe it as carnage the rest of the way.
My best opportunity to drop out would have been while doing through the start/finish line (convenient and safe), but I decided to give it one more lap. Mainly I didn't want to drop out in front of my wife and kids. Plus I figured everyone else felt equally bad, and if I could just stick with it...maybe I could make my goal of Top 50 just by surviving longer.
And that's pretty much what happened. I actually felt pretty good at the end of the 3rd lap (about Mile 20), and had no doubt I would finish, and was starting to enjoy myself as well (after all, 5:55 pace is not very hard). I was passing tons of people, and that kept me going too. And not only that, the bib numbers were getting high and higher, and I was starting to take some scalps.
At about Mile 22, my quads started to feel hammered, and I worried a little bit that they would give out. That was about the biggest struggle over the last part of the race. I was absolutely crawling (5:50-5:55 pace), but everyone was crawling worse, and I kept passing people. Passed bib #6 with about 5 miles to go, which is cool (Bobby Curtis). Then with about 2 miles to go, came up on Bib #8...could tell by the Newton singlet it was Cabada. While I certainly do not think that I am better than any of these people (far from it), it just goes to show what the marathon + heat does to people. The heat is no respector of persons. The heat killed my race and cause me to run a rancid 2:27 (disappointing after all those 100+ mile weeks)...but the heat also allowed me to finish Top 50, and beat some great runners that I really respect. I'll take the Top 50.
Anyway, I slogged on to the finish line, quads protesting the whole way. I passed 2 more people in the final 0.2 miles, which was the difference between Top 50 and not-Top 50. Final time was 2:27:24, and final place was 49th. Again, I don't think I'm the 49th fastest marathon runner in the U.S....but ran the 49th best race in the heat on the day of Trials. I'll take it, and I'm proud of that race.
What's really cool, is when I look at all the stats, I moved up 83 spots from Mile 1, 63 spots from the half marathon, 39 spots with 10K to go, and 10 spots with 1 mile to go. The moral to the story: don't stop running. Sometimes it pays to just finish the race.
Not sure what the future holds. I know I'm going to take 1-2 months off completely from running in order to try to let me body heal. I've had a sore groin for over 2 years, and I'm been stupid to run on it this long. If I can get it to heal complete through rest and core strength, maybe I'll try to keep running at a high level afterward. But if it doesn't heal, then I'm done...done with this crazy 100+ mile/week stuff. We'll see. But I'm definitely blessed to get in an Olympic Trials, and triple blessed to have 3 Trials...everything has to come together perfectly to get a qualifier, so getting 3 in is amazing. I've seen a lots of people get to Qualifer-level fitness, but not be able to get lucky with a nice day, so I don't take it for granted.
| Mile |
Time |
Split |
Placing |
| 1 |
00:05:26 |
0:05:26 |
136 |
| 2 |
00:10:45 |
0:05:19 |
130 |
| 3 |
00:15:57 |
0:05:12 |
129 |
| 4 |
00:21:15 |
0:05:18 |
132 |
| 5 |
00:26:37 |
0:05:22 |
119 |
| 6 |
00:31:59 |
0:05:22 |
105 |
| 7 |
00:37:28 |
0:05:29 |
122 |
| 8 |
00:42:50 |
0:05:22 |
121 |
| 9 |
00:48:07 |
0:05:17 |
120 |
| 10 |
00:53:28 |
0:05:21 |
117 |
| 11 |
00:58:52 |
0:05:24 |
108 |
| 12 |
01:04:18 |
0:05:26 |
|
| 13 |
01:10:03 |
0:05:45 |
112 |
| 14 |
01:15:46 |
0:05:43 |
113 |
| 15 |
01:21:26 |
0:05:40 |
112 |
| 16 |
01:27:12 |
0:05:46 |
109 |
| 17 |
01:33:05 |
0:05:53 |
107 |
| 18 |
01:38:54 |
0:05:49 |
|
| 19 |
01:44:54 |
0:06:00 |
|
| 20 |
01:50:41 |
0:05:47 |
88 |
| 21 |
01:56:25 |
0:05:44 |
80 |
| 22 |
02:02:20 |
0:05:55 |
75 |
| 23 |
02:08:14 |
0:05:54 |
67 |
| 24 |
02:14:08 |
0:05:54 |
|
| 25 |
02:20:16 |
0:06:08 |
59 |
| 26 |
02:26:10 |
0:05:54 |
51 |
| 26.2 |
02:27:24 |
0:01:14 |
49 |
| 