Best marathon time since Boston. I got all my legs had to give me today so I can't complain. I knew BQ was highly iffy; my training just did not go that well. Missed too many tempo runs and ran too many 5Ks in there. But if I'm not as fast as I was 2.5 years ago, I can still wring what I have out.
Too dark to see the Garmin for the first 3 or 4 miles so I just ran by feel and what traffic would permit. Which actually didn't work out too bad. I averaged 8:01 for the first 10K, which would have been OK if I could have followed it up with a strong second 10K. But between the toughest part of the course, a 1:43 stop at the portapotty and just some not very strong running, I got to the half in just under 1:51, and 8:27. Third segment was largely downhill and I took some advantage but not enough, averaging 8:08 from 21.1K to 30K. Last 7 miles were largely downhill as well and I just didn't have it. Then I pretty much bonked at mile 24 and struggled for the rest of the way, with 8:39 and 8:44 miles for 25 and 26. Managed a semi "sprint" for the last 0.22 which just got me down to the 8:00 pace I wanted all along.
But thanks to that little sprint and the pitstop in the first half, I wound up with my first lifetime negative split on a marathon. A whopping 22 seconds, but negative split nonetheless. Then I cramped. Bigtime. Hamstrings and calves. Nice volunteer helped me stretch the hammies as I lay supine on the grass. I wound up having to walk most of the way back to the hotel, which actually helped. Although I am hurting like a big dog now. I would say though that I squeezed out everything my legs had to give. I felt the calves trying to go a couple of times in the last three miles; after the finish they just went.
It's my fastest marathon since Boston, 2.5 years ago. I'm just not as fast as I was then; there's a reason why the BAA bumps up the AG standards by 5 to 10 minutes per five years. And I didn't execute the training plan properly either. Maybe if I'd trained properly I could have gone under 3:35. My time without the pitstop would have barely been a BQ next year when I jump up to the 55-59 AG. But I'll need to do better than that (and train better than that) to actually have a chance to get in the race for 2016.
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