Marathon Results

4:05:51, 9:23/mi pace.  Full details are here (select “Marathon” in the upper left hand drop-down menu, then enter my bib number, 506).  Not my best work, but in my corner is that this marathon course was by far the most difficult I have run.  This may come as something in the TMI (“too much information”) department, but one of the things that slowed me down was that I was unable to evacuate my bowels prior to the race, so I had to stop at a porta-potty at about 5.5 miles into the race.  Take away the 5+ minutes that I was delayed there and I achieve my goal of a 4 hour finish. 

 

That wasn’t the only complication, though (never is, is it?).  The course is a point-to-point race (i.e. starting at one place, and running to a completely different place; it does not end where it started), going from Big Sur south of Monterey and running north along the Highway 1, the Pacific Coast Highway.  The scenery was a beautiful as advertised, and so was the challenges presented by the terrain.  For a better idea about the race route and, more critically, the terrain profile, click here and scroll down to the bottom of the page.  I want to talk a little bit about a place called Hurricane Point.  This is a hill, about 2 miles long, that starts at mile 10 and goes through mile 12 or so.  It’s grade is about 5% and reportedly is one of the steepest and longest in any marathon.  I was warned about this place – “don’t go up that hill too fast, and especially don’t run down the back side of it too fast, you’ll blow out your quads!”  What can I say, I can’t keep myself from powering up a hill, even one that is 2 miles long!  I won the battle against the hill, not having to take a walk break going up it, and I listened to the advice about taking it easy down the backside.  But in the end, the hill won the war.  I didn’t realize how much that hill had taken out of my until about mile 17, when my legs just didn’t want to play the game anymore.  The rolling hills of the last 10 miles were pretty tough for me.  Did I mention that there was a still headwind from the north throughout the race?  That did not help things, either.

 

Even with all that, I am pleased with my overall performance on this “moderately difficult” (their terminology, not mine) course.  This was my first full marathon since the Honolulu Marathon in 2005.  I have now completed five full marathons – Twin Cities (2002), Lincoln (2003), Marine Corps (2003), Honolulu (2005), and now this one.  Until about a month before the race, my training and preparation for this one had by far been better than for all previous marathons.  Then the “train came off the track,” so to speak, and I tried to salvage what I could of my fitness in order to complete today’s race.  In that respect, completing the marathon in the time I did was an accomplishment in and of itself.

 

It’s time for some rest!  I hope to be back on here soon.

 

GJS