Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 6

At the end of the loop is a hill. Isn't that mean?

I couldn't do it. I walked it, promising myself I would run after it. Some TNT coach from Pennsylvania looked concerned and asked me if I was okay. I was like "Yeah. I just think it's mean that they put this hill here." And the guy next to me was like "Are you kidding? She's been kicking ass these last miles. I think she only stopped to walk it to make me feel better." I was like "Heh heh. Not quite." The coach looked placated and told us to stick together.

I started running again and saw...Coach Sandy! She asked how I felt and I told her crappy. But I said it with a smile on my face and told her I expected to feel crappy because it was a crappy course. See, I knew at this point that it was flat, which made me happy and gave me a little more energy. Also, my Garmin had died which made me SO HAPPY because I just kept seeing that "average pace" number go up and up which was discouraging. Now I was just running to finish it. Sandy was funny and was telling me that if I PRed here (which I thought I may be able to do) it would be amazing and not like if I PRed somewhere easy like Chicago :)

Sandy dropped me off at Coach Felicia, who ran with me for the next half mile. She kept telling me I was doing great for this course and that I was one of the first people on the team to come through. She dropped me off at Coach Mike.

Coach Mike was mostly concerned about me being injured, which I assured him I wasn't. He told me that Ramon was in the last mile and would run in with me.

I was SO HAPPY to see Ramon. He started running in with me and Bill joined me on the other side. He thought that was funny and said Bill was going to throw up if he kept running with me. Ramon asked me how far off I was from my PR and I said "A lot." And he asked how much 'a lot' was. I said "I don't know...2 or 3 minutes?" He was incredulous. "2 or 3 minutes?! 2 or 3 minutes?! Are you a crazy person? On this course? 2 or 3 minutes?! That is like, amazing!" He ran in with me the ENTIRE MILE, coaching me the whole time.

He kept picking up the pace on me (which I know he did on purpose) and I was so glad. It hurt a lot to speed up, but I was doing it and I knew I would be grateful at the end when I saw my time. He also kept pointing to little dips and cracks in the pavement as he was talking to me, which, for some reason, I found hilarious.

At some point, he was like "Look straight ahead. That is the finish line." I was like "Oh, thank GOD!" THAT was the point that I knew I would finish. I was never so happy to see a finish line. He offered some words of encouragement and told me to push it towards the finish line, which I did.

The clock overhead read 4:23, which meant that I came in under 4:22, which meant that I PRed. Whoo-hoo! (My official time was 4:20, a 2 minute PR!)

I was soooooooo happy to see those tuxedoed firemen handing out Tiffany's necklaces. For once in my life I took my time to go through the finisher's chute because I felt like I'd earned it.

A well-deserved finisher's medal from Tiffany's

Me, in the finisher's tent with my Tiffany's necklace

The coveted finisher's necklace

That night, we went out for the "Misbehaving Party". I had a lot of fun, of course. But the funniest thing was when Ramon asked me how far I was off of my PR. I was like "Actually, I PRed...by two minutes."
His response? "You asshole!" Then he went on to explain to my friends, "I see her at the end and she tells me she is way off her PR, then I find out she is 2 or 3 minutes off her PR, then she PRs. What an asshole." (It is much funnier if you read it in Ramon's Spanish accent and with his dramatic emphasis.)

Very cool marathon. Toughest marathon ever. But I have never felt so satisfied after finishing a marathon.

Rebecca, Lauren and Me at the Misbehaving Party

Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 5

It was no joke.

The pond was total hell.

First of all, it was this loop that lasted about 4 miles. Right at the end. And it was on a highway. AND it was only about the width of a running path in Central Park. My legs hurt so badly by this point and I was thinking of anything I could to keep my mind off of how many miles I still had left.

I promised myself that when I got to waterstops that I could walk through them. I needed to just WALK for a little bit, but couldn't justify it because I KNEW I would slow down. I was following a girl in pink, but she started to gradually get away from me, and I didn't care about time anymore anyway.

The first mile into the pond loop I stepped on someone's GU wrapper and it stuck to the bottom of my shoe. So with every step I kept hearing/feeling scrape, scrape, scrape. Then this girl behind me yelled out "Hey! New York!" I took all of my energy to turn around. "Let me get that off of your shoe! That must be driving you crazy."

I stopped, and tried to step on it while lifting my other foot up and blabbered "But...I just...it's not...I can't..." I felt tired and stupid. She was like "Don't worry. I've got it." and lifted my leg up so she could get it. "NOW you can run!" I thanked her profusely. It's the little things in those last miles. :)

The rest of the loop was pretty much an uneventful, horrible time. I was glad that there were a lot of TNT coaches from other chapters cheering. I walked a good deal of that loop. I so didn't care about my time anymore.

And when I got to the "Chocolate Mile" at 22, I actually considered eating the free Ghiradelli chocolate. I don't even really like chocolate all that much. But I wanted it badly. I also knew I was having a crap race and that I've never had chocolate during a race and that this probably wasn't a good idea. I wavered between getting it and passing it up for the entire mile. I was also craving homemade Rice Krispie Treats right at that moment. I wanted them more than anything. I skipped them though and opted for my last chocolate GU. Definitely not as yummy.

Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 4

Whoo-hoo! I was finished with the major hills. Unfortunately, I was feeling pretty drained from them. Like very sleepy. My legs were fine though, which I guess is the important part. I was also ready to take it to my 9:10 pace.

I did this pretty easily and still felt like I was holding back somewhat. It was a weird feeling because usually I do not hold back this long. I looked for Bill at mile 11, but didn't see him because the buses probably didn't get him there in time :( I knew I would probably see him at 16 though, so I didn't worry too much. I was heading into Golden Gate State Park, which is supposed to be the most beautiful part of the course.

I kept my pace, but for some reason, could not shake the tired feeling. There weren't a lot of people in the park cheering either, so that didn't help. Also, Safeway (one of the sponsors) had these cheering stations all along the park. The Safeway cheerleaders were going crazy so it helped. They also had those signs that you read as you go by. But these signs were NOT helpful. The first one said "You own this road because..." and I was all excited because I was like "Good. Distractions. This should be good." The next one was "You skipped sleeping in late on the weekend." Haha. Ok. Then "You nursed all those blisters." NO! Don't remind me of blisters! My feet only are kind of hurting, so I don't need to think about them. Then "You worked until your muscles were sore." OMG! SHUT UP! Who made these signs and thought they were a good idea?! "You went through 3 pairs of shoes." OK. That one was a LITTLE better, but still reminded me that I could kind of feel the road on my feet at this point.

The cool thing though, was that there was a turnaround and you could see your teammates on the other side. I waved to a couple of people on my team. Good distractions.

Coming out around mile 16 I saw Ramon! He ran with me awhile and warned me about the Pond area too. He said I looked good. I should keep my pace. I needed to find someone to follow in the pond area so that I would keep my pace because it was going to suck, but that once I got out it would be almost over and he would catch me at the end.

Then I saw Bill! He ran alongside me awhile and I had a million things to tell him. Like:

1. Pete said I was in 2nd for the team, and although I didn't necessarily believe him, it was still cool.
2. I had hit my 5 mile and 10 mile targets and was 2 minutes off of my 15 mile target, but felt like I could totally make that time up.
3. The hills were WAY worse than the Flying Pig. Like 10x worse.
4. I was still pretty much on track to smash 4 hours (minus those 2 minutes)
5. I still felt good. A little tired, but hey! It was mile 16!

I was super hungry though, so I decided to eat another GU at 18, even though I wasn't due for one until 20. While I was running in a straight line this girl decides to diagonally cut across the course RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME. I couldn't slow down so I just reacted.

"ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Oh! Sorry!"

And then my ankle went into a hole while the rest of my body kept running. Nice.

Honestly though, I couldn't feel it (the twist). I WAS getting pretty sleepy though. It was here I ran into Pete again. I told him I was tired, but felt good. He ran with me for a LONG time and told me to find someone to run with in the pond area (again) otherwise I would fall off pace. It is boring. It is a highway. There is no one there to cheer for you.

I knew all this. But I was still not looking forward to it. And I WAS glad that everyone kept warning me because I HATE when people underprepare you for something.

I was getting more and more tired as I felt like I was running along the longest stretch of highway ever...and I wasn't even to the pond yet! I must have been slowing down too, because now my watch said my average pace was 9:28. Hmph.

Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 3

Lining up at the Start Corrals

Yay! WOMEN'S marathon! There were a million port-o-lets so I only had to wait in a line 2 people deep pre-race. I then headed over to my corral. I was in a pretty intimidating corral. It was the third one and the pace on my wrist band said 7:59-8:59. That seemed like a HUGE window to me. So I stayed way in the back :) I found Bill (or I guess he found me) and he gave me my Garmin with 60% power. Good deal. It wouldn't last me the whole race, but by the time it pooped out I wouldn't need it for pace anymore.

I was MUCH happier after I saw Bill and got my Garmin

My big thing? I was going to run this race correctly, which involved me holding back at the start. I am notoriously bad at doing this. But I kept repeating Ramon's mantra "BEHAVE" in my head. For some reason? I already had to pee again. I JUST went! Geezle. I figured it was just nerves.

I was so good at behaving. So, so good!

My first mile was a 9:21. Second mile 9:20. (So awesome!!! I was shooting for 9:20 pace up to mile 6.) The scenery was great and the weather was perfect. And the coolest thing? At mile 2.3 there was a coat check. There were a bunch of volunteers standing there with bags for you with tags on them. As you ran by, you shoved your sweats or whatever in the bag and they stuck a sticker on you with the corresponding number. Genius!

Unfortunately I still had to go to the bathroom. Fortunately there was a long line of port-o-lets and enough of them that there was no line. I could not BELIEVE I was stopping to pee before 3 miles. But crazily enough, I felt so much better afterwards. Guess it wasn't just nerves.

I was on the lookout for mile 3, which Ramon said was a big hill. Not big on the elevation chart, but it would seem big because it was a quick rise over a small distance. When I got to it, I was glad he pointed it out to us the day before. It was kind of like a Queens Half Marathon hill...no big deal, but a huge deal if you weren't expecting hills until mile 6.

I really felt GREAT.

I kept maintaining my pace and the miles were flying by. Unfortunately it was a super foggy day, so when everyone was yelling for us to get our cameras out (who runs with a camera) to take a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge, all I saw was gray.

Here it comes, here it comes...Ft. Mason. The dreaded hill. (I am not making this up. It is actually called Ft. Mason.) Now, Ramon said that it took him 9 minutes to climb this hill. This is not cool, because he is super speedy. The hill is over a mile long and super steep. And it is one of those hills that goes up, turns a corner, goes up some more, turns a corner and then goes up some more. It totally drained me.

I understand why, in Ramon's plan, there was such a gap. He had suggested paces for miles 1-6, and then 10-17 and 17-the end. This is because we were not supposed to keep track of pace on the hills between 6 and 10. If we did we would be all thrown off.

This hill took me 11:30 to climb. Yuck. And it was a little less than a mile (0.9).

What was cool though, is that they had these progressive signs along the hill that said things like:

Run like a girl
Laugh like a girl
Kiss like a girl
Achieve like a girl
Love like a girl

etc etc etc.

When I am running I am totally a basket case emotionally, so this got to me. I was almost teary and thinking stupid things like Yeah. They're right. It is so cool to be a girl. I do not understand myself when I am running. :)

The OTHER cool thing is that when you ran DOWN the hill there was this camera recording the whole thing and projecting it onto a huge screen, so you could see yourself. Fun!

I was very careful to run the downhills smart. I was so afraid I was going to hammer my quads and pay for it in the end.

These stupid guys by me would NOT shut up about the hills. I guess the one guy had run it before and he was saying that we got to do hill 6 all over again in a little bit. Now, I KNEW this, but in my head, it wasn't so bad the second time. So these guys were almost psyching me out and I was like "Lalalalalalalalala I can't hear you!" (No, I didn't actually say this out loud, just in my head).

I saw Ramon and heard about every three words of what he was yelling at me. "Way to...Em...just...Em...too...soon...Em...OK!" OK?

While I felt like I was going to die on these hills, afterwards I actually felt ok. In fact, I felt FAST. So I knew I was going to be okay.

I hit the second hill and it was really really tiring me out. Luckily, I saw Rob and Erin from the NYC LLS office and they were cheering like crazy!

When I was almost up the hill I also saw Coach Pete (he coaches the Advanced Group with Coach Steve all the time). I was SO HAPPY to see him. I asked him "This is the last of the BIG hills, right?" He kind of avoided my question. But he did tell me that I looked good, I was right on track, and that I was the 2nd runner from the NYC team. (Awesome!) He also told me that I should enjoy the run now because when I got to the pond (mile 18ish-24) it was going to suck and that I needed to mentally prepare for it, but that he would be there at the entrance. Ok. Good to know.

I was still flying high on the fact that I was doing so well.

I just kept thinking that when I saw Ramon again I was going to tell him how I was behaving.

Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 2

Our Team, Pre-Race (See the girl allllllll the way to the left with only half of her face showing? My head is right behind hers.)

BeCAUSE I am anal retentive, I had been charging my Garmin since we arrived in San Francisco. It was sitting right on my nightstand. My running friend Lauren thought this was overkill. :) I thought she was probably right, so, the night before the marathon I took it out of the charger and put it on top of my running clothes, which had also been sitting out since we arrived.

I wrote down my pace windows on my right hand with a Sharpie.

Basically what I wrote was this:

9:20 1-6
9:10 10-17
9:00 17-END

Mile 5: 45:30-48:30
Mile 10: 1:32-1:34
Mile 15: 2:16-2:21
Mile 20: 3:02-3:05

It's a good thing that my handwriting is small.

I actually slept well (the perk to running a west coast marathon is the time difference). I woke up to start getting ready and as I was Bodygliding I decided to check the time on my Garmin.

It. Was. Blank.

Completely blank. As in...no charge.

Freak out!!!

Now, let me explain something. Despite what you may think, I am NOT a runner who is tethered to the Garmin and can't function without it. HOWEVER, I had not planned on not having a Garmin. ESPECIALLY since I was trying to break 4:00. My brain does NOT function correctly on marathon day, so calculating splits in my head to make sure I was on track wasn't going to work. As I checked the Garmin charging on the nightstand, I realized that it was only charging about 1% per minute. Uh oh.

So here was the plan:
I take Bill's $9 digital watch, which doesn't have a lap function. Bill feverishly figured out my cumulative paces for the first 9 miles on a sheet of paper which I would carry with me. I go down to meet the team in the lobby, head over, get into the corral and wait for Bill to come with my Garmin with as much charge as it could get by 6:20. If I missed him, I would catch him at mile 11 and he could give me the Garmin.

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Not cool.

I gave Bill and hug and headed downstairs. Since I was already pushing my limits to beat the 4:00 mark, I decided to Plan B the time goal too. I just was not mentally there anymore :(

Nike Women's Marathon Race Report 1

Yay! I'm back from San Francisco!

Since I have soooooooooo much to say and a super busy week ahead, I am going to parcel out my race reports over the week. So this will be the first installment.

I do have to say:
• Although I was well prepared for the hills, they still sucked the life out of me
• This course was the HARDEST course I've ever run (10x worse than the Pig)
• I finally ran a marathon I was happy with, EVEN THOUGH I was no where near my goal of breaking 4 hours
• All the little touches that made this a "women's" marathon were very very cool
• I'm going to have to run with TNT again. I was sort of ready for "retirement" but running with them is just too much fun

Anyway, I will start with the expotique.

It was VERY VERY small. I mean, it took me like 15 minutes to go through, tops. Then I realized why: Nike was sponsoring it. Why would they allow other vendors there? Duh. So the expotique basically consisted of a tent (pictured above) where you pick up your number and chip (no t-shirt until you finish the race). You could also get a free pedicure (Ramon would have had a fit if any of his runners did this, though) and taste some flavored oxygen. If you walked around the corner there were free samples of Kashi. But that was truly it.

Across the street though, was the Nike store. I had already checked out all of the merchandise online, so I knew exactly what I wanted! The other good thing about a women's marathon? No bulky sweats or tees! Everything is tailored towards women (and over the top cute).

How cool is this? All of the participants names were on the outside of Niketown!

Lauren, me and Rebecca in our cute Nike Women's Marathon Hoodies

Across the street at Macy's they had a runner's lounge, which basically consisted of a couch in the juniors section and free Italian sodas.

Macy's on Union Square

The night before the race, we had the famous TNT Pasta Dinner!


All of the New York team had to be obnoxious again, and let everyone know who we were. Strangely enough, we ran into a couple of girls who decided to wear "I Heart SF" shirts from another team. They wanted to have their picture taken with us :)

The dinner was like a million times bigger than the one for Marine Corps. There were 5,000 runners there! It took about 5 minutes to walk through the throngs of coaches and staff members cheering for us. IT WAS SO COOL!

There's Ramon (in the blue) cheering like crazy for us!

Walking through the Cheer Tunnel

It was very inspirational. Joan Benoit Samuelson spoke (which was so cool!) as well as the Penguin. He, of course, made everyone laugh and feel inspired all at once.

About 30 seconds to the end of his speech he said something like "When you are running those 26.2 miles tomorrow..." which is pretty much the last thing I heard because all of the sudden my stomach dropped and I was like 'No. No. Not tomorrow. I do NOT want to run 26.2 miles tomorrow.'

I had never felt that way before. Weird.

Marathon Plan

It has been quite a busy week! I completed my last speed work session right to the letter, had a nice little 5 mile run on Saturday, with an average pace of 9:38, and got the course overview from Ramon.

Based on Ramon's course assessment, and running all of his numbers based on this course, he came up with three goal times for me.

If absolutely EVERYTHING goes right (including things I cannot control, like weather) I can hope for a time in the 4:03 - 4:05 range. He calls this my "aggressive" time goal.

My "achievable" time goal is 4:06-4:10.

My "conservative" time goal is 4:10-4:13.

Bummer. So close to breaking the 4:00 time wall. Now I am at a real Catch-22, here. Knowing my history of predicting my finishing times, I should be looking at a 4:13 PLUS according to this. HOWEVER, I have learned a TON about racing in this past season...which makes me think that the 4:03-4:05 is actually acheivable and what I should be shooting for. In my mind? I am still breaking the 4:00 mark. This either:

A) Sets me up for huge disappointment, when I don't get it, but actually run a really good race and PR
B) Makes me work harder for it and I smash the goal
C) Makes me work harder for it, which makes me run the race stupidly, which makes me not get it

This is why the mental game is so important...almost as important as the physical part of training.

I also know of some "trouble spots" on the course.

Mile 6 is supposedly the largest hill, lasting 0.9 miles. Ramon said that we are fine on the uphill since we trained so hard on hills this season. The worrisome part is the downhill. Many races are lost this way (by taking the downhill too fast). I am actually not worried about this at all. I run my downhills a little conservatively with my feet under me because so many people have scared me into thinking I am going to "hammer my quads" and not be able to finish in all of my races.

The other trouble spot I'm looking out for?

From mile 19-23.5. Here is where you make a nice little loop around a pond. Coach Steve called it the "attitude changer". He was right at the entrance last year so he could see all of his runners coming in and going out and he said the difference was incredible. Pretty much smiling and happy at the entrance to even the most "proper" runners dropping multiple f-bombs at the end of the loop. Plus, there are the tiniest of hills in here. Not a big deal if it was the beginning of the race, but a huge deal at the end.

Knowing my past races, I expect this to be a huge trouble spot for me.

The third spot is right out of the park. Here, you are running along the oceanside for the last miles. It is flat and the scenery doesn't change, and there's little crowd support. Ugh. Why do all marathons do this? It is like the worst mental test!

Ramon says the key to breaking the big 4, is to be nice, conservative and disciplined during the first 10 miles. (Yeah, this pretty much goes against how I race.) On the flat parts, I should be aiming for a 9:20 pace to mile 6. (On the hills I shouldn't care about pace, but maintain effort.) From mile 10-17 I can bring it up to a 9:10 pace. If I feel okay at this point, I can speed it up and get closer to a 9 min mile pace.

According to Ramon, it's all decided at mile 17.

If I was "good" I will break the 4 hours. If I "misbehaved" I will not break it.

WHEW!

Lots of pressure.

He also has check points for me.

Mile 5: 45:30-48:30
Mile 10: 1:32-1:34
Mile 15: 2:16-2:21
Mile 20: 3:02-3:05

Information overload. Yes, now I AM freaking out.

Always Onto the Next Thing

I know, I know, I should be writing about the Pig, since it's this weekend. BUT I have been doing a lot of cool TNT things lately, so I had to post.

First of all, I got to meet all of the other mentors at a potluck. It was fun, there were cupcakes, it was on a roofdeck downtown on a sunny day...do I have to say more?

I also found out something cool...

Coach Steve, the coach who was not going to coach anymore because he was going to med school, is coming back!!! Unfortunately, he has no idea where he is going to med school yet, but for the time being he is going to coach. I am SO EXCITED because he and Ramon are my favorite coaches ever. I actually got to work more with Steve than Ramon, because Ramon sort of belongs to all of the groups and Steve was always with the advanced group. He is the one that coached me through that awful bridge in the Marine Corps Marathon. I can't wait to work with him again. He made me go FAST. Yay!

Also, last night I went to the Nike Women's Marathon preview party to help recruit marathoners for the event. It was fun, and I do like talking to people and trying to convince them that yes, they CAN do a marathon. We had to watch a preview video of the event and it made me SO EXCITED to be training for it!

Our big selling points for the event?

• We get a Tiffany's necklace instead of a medal
• This Tiffany's necklace is handed to us by a San Francisco fireman in a tuxedo
• Very cute Nike shirts
• Pedicure stops along the marathon (uh, I want to PR, not get a pedicure)
• Chocolate stop at mile 22 (Gross)
• It's in San Francisco

In addition, I had a few things that sold me on the event.

• It is the biggest TNT marathon...the pasta party sat 7,000 in one room last year
• Gina said I had to do it because it is the coolest marathon ever
• I get all excited in big groups of enthusiasm, and that's what it seems like this will be

I also saw my friend Eric last night, and he warned me "Don't listen to anyone who tells you the hills aren't bad on that course. They are lying to you."

I actually appreciated that. It's nice to know, because that's all I have been hearing from people.

Anyway, I am excited about my next marathon, even though the one I'm training for hasn't even been run yet.