I ran the Eagle Creek Trail Marathon as part of the training I've been doing for a 50k coming up this September. My goals for this race was to finish, finish uninjured, work on nutrition, and gain some long distance race experience.
I thought I would have had more anxiety the night before. I got an email confirmation earlier in the night that my deferred entry for last year's Tecumseh Trail marathon was made active for this year's. (I was in a car accident and beset with other injuries last fall. Luckily the Tecumseh race allows deferments in such events.) The excitement at this news pretty much wiped away the slight nervousness. This allowed me to get a decent night's sleep !!!
I wanted to have a solid race. I also have been struggling to find things to eat while running. Fueling while running has been a struggle for me. I follow the Whole 9 nutrition plan so eating a lot of "normal" runners fuel isn't in the equation. I've never had shot blocks, goo, or gels of any kind in my endurance training. During the marathon I took pitted dates with roasted almonds in them. They were a complete fail. The date portion was too big and I chewed forever. Then I used up way too much water to try and get them down. Luckily, I also had two lara bars with me. I ate a blueberry muffin one and later forced myself to eat a quarter of another. Overall, I don't think I had enough food while running. Still something I need to work on.
The other issue I had was my pace. I started out way too fast, but it felt good. I started the first half ranging between eight and a half to ten minute miles. I train by doing Maffetone heart rate training. This enables me to run ten to twelve minute miles while staying in an aerobic zone. This enables me to use my body fat as fuel (a near unlimited fuel source) as opposed to my glycogen stores (a very limited fuel source). I dropped the heart rate for the race. I did bump up the heart rate alarm on my Garmin watch just to kind of give me an idea of where my effort was. The alarm was mostly ignored during most of the race. Another failure.
The first half was pretty uneventful. At the beginning I passed a lot of people on the uphills and then on the downhills. I was kind of surprised at how the group I was in used a lot of their quads to brake themselves on the downhills. I like to use gravity to speed down the declines in a kind of controlled recklessness. It's safer than it sounds, but it sure beats using up all that energy to gingerly go down hills. I just thought it was odd that I was the only one in this group of runners to go down hills this way.
As I came upon the half way mark of the race (which went through the finish line. The course was a horseshoe shaped lollipop that was a half marathon distance long) I saw that my half time was two hours and six minutes. I wasn't sure if the pace I was doing was going to be sustainable. I hadn't really trained myself to put this much effort into this long of a distance. So far the only issue I had was running in the open field with the sun beating down on me. Temperature wise it was a great day for running, though the humidity was high (almost 100%).
Everything was going smoothly and I was still maintaining my pace. It was around this time that I had the failed date and almond experience. There was a half marathon taking place as well and I was starting to see friends running that race coming in the opposite direction. Each friendly face was a good morale boost. At one aid station, my friend Christy (who I thought was out of town) was there to cheer everybody on. That was a great surprise and an amazing morale booster !!! (I think I might have told her that multiple times later in the day)
Somewhere between miles 16 and 18 my left calf started acting up. I could feel it going right to the edge of cramping up and just staying on the verge. Then the feeling would go away. Then the feeling would creep back up several minutes later. Again, my calf felt like it was flirting on the edge of becoming what I knew would be a painful Charley horse then it would go away.
Around this time I started to drink the electrolyte drinks at the aid stations to see if they would help with the issue with my calf. I had took an endurolyte pill at the beginning of the race and sometime during the race. I figured drinking the liquid form couldn't hurt. I kept hoping for an aid station with a banana but that never happened. I figured the potassium would help.
As I came into another aid station it happened to be the one where Christy was at !!! Yay !!! I downed two cups of blue electrolyte and maybe a cup of water and was on my way. (My Camel bak ran out of water about three miles ago) About a quarter of a mile down the trail I had the thought that I should have left the empty pack with Christy. D'oh !!!
Shortly after leaving the aid station my calf flared up worse. I stopped for a hot second to stretch the calf which helped immensely. The uphills were aggravating it and, as an extra bonus, I was starting to feel nauseous. I never use any electrolyte drink with my training, I blamed this feeling on the blue fluid. So now I was faced with the dilemma of continue to drink something that may or may not be keeping a potential cramp at bay, not have a cramp but puke my brains out, or continue drinking the blue stuff at the aid stations (and risk puking my brains out and having a massive Charley horse at the same time)
My pace was starting to suffer but not too much. I was dropping down but persevering. I only had about five to six miles to go. I knew that if I made it to the causeway bridge part of the course I would be homefree. The bridge gave my calf some relief as it was on a decline heading towards the finish. Then as I hopped the guardrail to get to the trail portion of the course my calf cramped as I landed. I immediately flexed my towards towards my body and the cramp went away just as quickly as it appeared.
It was around here that I got Johnny Cash's song "25 minutes to go" roiling through my head.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVxQcsdpWI (here's a link to the song) I couldn't remember most of the words but the countdown chorus part was going through my mind. At one point I came out of the forest onto a service road portion of the route and momentarily bent down to stretch my calf. Looking up, I saw my wife and our friend Heather coming in the opposite direction. I was so glad to see them !!! I told them about my calf as we high fived each other. My wife asked where my heart rate was at (which was at 145 bpm at the time) Looking back the issue with my calf was slowing me down to my aerobic zone, which might not have been a bad thing. I exited the road and was back on the forest trails for another couple of miles to the finish.
I came upon the field with the finish and was glad to be there. I got my finishers medal and knew that I had to keep moving. My calf was tightening up and taking the rest of my legs with them. The growing unpleasantness in my legs was making me wonder if I had injured myself. I walked to the car and sat in the driver's seat and started massaging and stretching my legs. I was totally zoning out and gaining some relief from my messaging. I don't know how long I sat there but after a while all the pain had subsided. I grabbed a coconut water from the cooler and downed it fast. Then walked back to the finish line with the cooler. I saw that my finish was 4:26:13 and was 20th place overall. I only lost 13 minutes compared to the first half which surprised me.
Overall, I completed most of my goals for the race. I managed to finish and finish uninjured which were major pros. (Though I was really scared at the momentary tendinitis that I experienced soon after finishing) I think I had more cons than pros though. I would say the few pros out weighed the cons. I failed at keeping my competitiveness in check. The calf problem, I am guessing, stems from starting the first half of the race at an effort that I wasn't trained at maintaining for a whole marathon distance. I think if I would have been about one or two minutes slower per mile on the first half I might have avoided that problem. I also failed at my nutrition conundrum. (I don't know why I can't get this down !!!) My two liter hydration pack didn't last over twenty miles. I was even drinking at most aid stations. I do have a three liter pack that I might have to switch to for the 50k race. (But the 50k race is in late September where the cooler temperatures will mean less water consumption) I was surprised at my placing and my finishing time though. Those last two things are what makes this training run a failing success. I'll take it !!!
By the Numbers
Distance: 26.2 miles
First half time: 2 hours 6 minutes 26 seconds
Second half time: 2 hours 19 minutes 50 seconds
Average pace: 10 minutes 2 seconds per mile
Time: 4 hours 26 minutes 16 seconds
Fastest mile: 8:48 (mile 7)
Slowest mile:12:01 (mile 25)
Average Heart Rate: 154 bpm
Maximum Heart Rate: 172 bpm
Nutrition
Breakfast: Scrambled eggs with chia meal, cherry tomatoes, black olives, avocados, and pickled okra
Race: One and a quarter blueberry muffing lara bars and one date stuffed with two roasted almonds. two endurlyte capsules
Gear:
Shoes: Altra Lone Peak 1.5
Socks: Injini midweight black socks
Clothes: Nike running shorts, Muzuno compression calf sleeves, buff, and Nike BARA singlet
Other: 2 liter Rogue Camelbak, amphipod belt, Garmin foreunner GPS watch with heart rate monitor
