It’s been a very long time since I’ve written anything… I’ve successfully managed to keep up with my MBA coursework and am just 3 classes away from graduation in December. I also have been able to keep up with my running goals for the year completing a 10k in April, a 9-mile event in June (I actually did 12 miles), and now a half-marathon in August. I also did a 27-mile hike while we were in Washington in July. Past that… have not really kept up with my goals much, hence me not posting on here. But since I’m here today let’s talk about how my race went yesterday.
The Plan
In my 10k I felt like I pushed too hard on the first half and ran out of steam about 2/3rd of the way through. In my 12-mile event I had been more willing to walk in the early part of the race and felt that paid off with somewhat better endurance down the stretch. For this one I wanted to go out slower than my goal pace and then hopefully feel ready for the back half where I could pick up the pace more and finish strong. My goal was a 12-minute pace which seemed plausible. I had done a few 6ish mile runs near 11 minute paces and not felt like that was overly taxing. There was more elevation on this course (approx.. 1400 ft) but that’s still only about 100 ft/mile which is not unusual for some of my runs. I was concerned that what might happen is I execute my plan for the first half of the race but then why I need to turn the pace up feel a bit worn out and just can’t do it and end up being well behind my goal time since I did not bank any “good” times in the first half.
The Race
I started off a little too far back in the pack for the pace I wanted to go at to start. I was literally behind a couple that had their 10-year-old with them. Most of this race is on a single-track (think mountain bike path) so we’re running single file to start. I say running but I was really just walking quickly. There was another runner between me and them and it’s not like we were all falling a great distance behind the rest of the group so I just waited until he decided to pass them after a few minutes and went with him. I stayed with him for a while as we passed a few others before ultimately settling in behind a runner that was much closer to the pace I was trying to run for the first lap. I don’t mind getting paced like that because it keeps me from going out too hard. Eventually she decided to take a break to walk so I forged on ahead.
From even before the race had started I noticed my heart rate was reading quite high on my Garmin compared to my normal resting heart rate. This continued into the race with my watch repeatedly warning me that my heart rate was high (entering zone 5 – roughly 172) in this opening lap. I didn’t really hold back as I was trying to stick to my pace goals but even in the easier stretches I was barely back into the 160s. I knew this was going to be a real problem but figured I might as well just keep trying to stick with my pace for as long as possible.
The laps (3 laps of about 4.5 miles) end with a pretty brutal hill, 116 feet over 0.38 miles, the final 0.2 miles of which are a paved path at a 7.5% slope. I knew I was going to take that hill easier so I slowed to a speedy walk. I didn’t feel too bad and had gotten a lap in around the pace I wanted. Tried to walk a bit more as I went across the top back to the start line to let my heart rate drop and then picked up the running again. I reached the 6-mile mark in 1:13:24 which I was content with but it was becoming clear to me there was no way I was going to be able to push on the back half to reach my goal. At about 6.5 miles I stumbled on a root but managed to catch myself before falling. Since my goal time was out of reach I decided to be smart, slow down and walk a bit, and not be too unsafe.
The next 5.5 miles were a mix of walking and running with me struggling to focus on walking quickly when I slowed to a walk. I’d try and walk the uphills and run more on the downhills and level parts. Near the end of lap two the fact that I still had over 4 miles to go felt pretty daunting. My mile times pretty quickly started to drop off. 13:02, 14:10, 14:52, 14:58, 15:35, 15:29. My second 6 miles was 1:28:05, about 15 minutes slower than my first. Still I hit the 12-mile mark in 2:41:29 (about 17 minutes quicker than my event in June). The 13th mile was pretty hard and I could barely muster a jog for a few small stretches. Mostly just walking and feeling totally beat. And then I got to that hill.
The Finish
I had one guy pass me near the end as we were coming up to the last hill. He was moving a lot better than me at that point! When we got to the paved part I did not feel like I was capable of making it up without a break. So I stopped at the bottom and just tried to rest a bit and let my heart rate calm down. I was light-headed and probably as physically exhausted as I’ve ever been. My watch says I only waited about 3 minutes before managing to walk for 45 seconds and took another 90 second break. Either way 5 minutes after arriving at the hill I had barely budged. I felt like I might not be able to make it up the hill and if I did get up there I might cross the finish line, sit down, and never get back up.
Eventually I just started trying to take it 30 steps at a time. Mostly couldn’t even make it that many before I felt I needed a break. Bit by bit though I made my way up the hill and eventually the slope lessened a bit and I was walking to the finish line to receive my finisher’s medal. I made it back to the nearby shelter where the aid station was and got some Tailwind (electrolyte drink) and sat down and started to recover. I don’t believe I was the last finisher (33 of us did the half-marathon, they had a 5k and a 10k as well) but I wouldn’t be surprised if I was the most destroyed at the end. Below is my run/walk/idle chart for the final excruciating 12 minutes it took me to cover a quarter mile. No, I didn’t run at all it’s just categorizing the pace that way for some reason.
The Lessons Learned
As this is only my 3rd ever race and my longest so far I have a lot to learn and this race taught me a lot of valuable things. First of all I need to stop throwing unrealistic goals out in front of me for these races. Road/sidewalk pace does not translate very well to dirt trail pace. It’s a different kind of running and much less predictable. I’ve done some reading online and everyone says do not worry about pace. Worry about effort and take what the trails give you. If you’re doing the same race you’ve done before or a trail you’re familiar with you might be able to use previous results to see what a benchmark might be but you can’t just plop “12-minute miles” onto a race and know what that would mean out there. And when you’re talking about effort level it’s all about your heart rate and not over-exerting yourself and blowing up. For a textbook definition of that see my heart rate chart for this race…
Ugly for a race that ended with me struggling to keep going. So next time I need to pay more attention to my heart rate even in the first lap and if I’m struggling to keep it down I need to try walking even before I feel like it. It was possible in the 10k to blow up a bit and fight to the finish for a mile. It’s a whole nother story trying to fight to the finish for 4-5 miles. Also it may only be 100 feet/mile of vert but the total matters more than the amount in each mile, the accumulation does your legs in. Longer distances also mean you have to be that much more on your game or the punishment is much worse.
On that note too I badly screwed up my nutrition and hydration for this longer race. I have gained more weight than I wanted in the last 6 weeks so I had been trying to avoid snacking as the week came to a close and didn’t do any extra eating in preparation for the race. I think all I had between lunch Friday and the race on Saturday morning was an egg with some cheese and sandwich meat, a slice of bread, and some pudding. I was running on an empty stomach basically. If you’re going to stay in the lower heart rate zones that might not be the worst as your body is looking to fat reserves for fuel in those zones but as you get into zone 4 and 5 it wants glycogen carbohydrates to burn. This is why marathon runners are known to carbo load in the days before a race. Spending three hours out there means I probably would have benefited from taking in some calories during the race as well.
I also drank only about 1.5L of water between the time I woke up and the end of the race. Just based on how long I was out there that was probably not enough. I think next time I’d like to get up a little earlier on the morning of the race so I can get hydrated better. Then make sure I’m arriving there early enough to feel like I have plenty of time to get prepared and use the restroom before the race.
I think the half-marathon distance was a hard one for me to approach too. Clearly if I had been doing a 10k today and only running 6.2 miles I would have finished feeling good and without needing to walk much at all. That’s a race I can run at this point. A longer race like the 21-mile one I want to do in October is clearly too much for me to think about just running so I’m going to be inclined to walk plenty. The half-marathon sits there in the middle tempting me to try and run basically the whole thing but probably beyond my capabilities to do that at this point. Maybe on a fairly flat road course I could do it, but not on trails with 1400 feet of elevation.
Up Next
I’ve got about 6 weeks until our Market-to-Market relay where I will be running an unknown number of miles in at least 3 legs. I’m hopeful I can keep my heart rate down better because those should be fairly straight forward miles more comparable to my training runs. If so and knowing none of the legs will be longer than a 10k I’m hopeful I can avoid burning out so badly and put together a solid day. I think I can do a good number of miles in zones 1-3 at this point if I can just keep myself from over-exerting myself. Then in about 2 months I’ll have my 21-mile event at Lake Cunningham. Don’t believe that will have quite as much elevation as this one did and I’m committed at this point to approaching it with more focus on my heart rate and trying to put out consistent sustainable effort for 4-5 hours, whatever pace that may be at.