Is this thing on? Rock 'n' Roll USA Race Report

Well, I've taken to slacking on the blog thing, but I think writing race reports is a good way to at minimum learn and look back to see how I can improve for future races. Things have been pretty busy with training, grad school, and most importantly, family time making blogging the least of my priorities. On to the recap...

I got all of the logistical stuff out of the way (packet pickup) on Thursday so that left Friday with just work and no pressure to get anything done. Saturday, we got up about 10 minutes late due to a bit of an alarm snafu, but nothing major and we were out the door by 6 which was our goal.

We arrived at RFK about 6:45 with plenty of time to spare. As we walked towards the Armory to drop off our gear, we ran into our friend Brad who incidentally was also planning on pacing me. We hit the port-o-pots real quick, and then went to the Armory. There we saw a few others from our running crew and caught up with them for a few. We dropped our bags, completely lost Julie, and then decided to hit the bathrooms once again before the start. The lines took a bit and we had to jog to the start as to not miss it and get caught up with the masses. This was probably a good move to help get the juices flowing. What do you know...one towards the front, we saw Julie and a bunch of other friends. Then Chrissy, Brad, and I moved up towards the back of the first corral and after the National Anthem, we were soon off.

Mile one was pretty much as planned. Backing up a bit, I had a goal of sub 1:30. My previous PR is a 1:33:47 set in September at the Parks Half Marathon. I know I've been training well for this (and my tris coming up), but some of my fast paced workouts seemed a bit too labored to me. For the Rock n Roll, I wanted to go out at 7:10, 7, and then onto 6:50 pace for the remainder and hopefully have enough to make up the slower first couple miles in the last mile or two. Through the first four or five miles things were going well. At about the mile 4 point, there is a turn around and we saw Chrissy up ahead of us a bit. She was looking great, but I was worried we were so close (she wasn't "racing" per se, but looking to run strong and hopefully PR along the way - at least faster than her Parks PR). We then began to hit some decent hills and keeping pace began getting tougher. At the half way point I was only 2 seconds off of my goal so that was good - but unfortunately, that began to get higher. At mile 10, I hit my 10 mile PR at about 1:09:04. That's over two minutes faster than the 10 mile mark at Parks. I knew I was going to be close to getting my PR, but at this point, things began to get tough. I hit mile 11 on an uptick picking up a few precious seconds (even though my Garmin read significantly long for this portion), but I was now off by about 20 seconds or so. Mile 13 had a nice downhill and through some nice "encouragement" (taunting more like it) from Brad, I really picked it up on 13. Thankfully it was downhill and I let gravity do its job. As we approached the end of 13, we turned up towards the finish and the f'n course starts going uphill. I somehow dug deep enough to run a 6:21 pace over the final 1.13 miles (definitely more than .1 AFTER the 13 mile marker). I hit stop on my watch, only to see this...

I'm usually not quick on the trigger so I was pretty sure I'd manage to sneak under 1:30...which I ultimately did and finished with a new PR of 1:29:58!

Pacer/motivator/taunter Brad and me at the finish.


As far as nutrition during the race, I took water and Gatorade at all of the stops. I also grabbed a Gu around mile 8, but I just took a very small bit of that. My stomach just was not in the mood for it. I'm not sure I needed one, but I kind of wish I could have taken one in. I used EFS Liquid Shot at Chicago and I wanted one for this race, but couldn't get my hands on one before the race. But I plan to have it on hand for the next race and hope that makes a difference and helps me feel a bit better towards the end.

Once the race was over, Chrissy and some of our running crew were waiting at the end. Chrissy Rocked it once again, coming in with a 1:28:01 (man she's pissed at those 2 seconds!)!

Women's 35-39 First Place baby!
She wasn't going all out though since she's a month out from Boston, but she did manage to once again claim top honors in her age group (once a little bit of controversy clears up - I don't think men are supposed to be in the women's 35-39 age group, but I could be wrong...).

All in all, I'm very pleased with my results and according to McMillan, that puts me at a 3:09:44 marathon - BQ! Well, I'll still have to go out and actually run that fast, but it's nice to see that I should be able to do it!

2 months til Columbia and then another three til Eagleman!

The XMP Crew

Rehoboth Beach Half Marathon Race Report!

Saturday (12/10) was the Rehoboth Beach Marathon and Half Marathon. Last year I was a spectator and my wife ran the full. We brought the girls with us last year and myself and the little ones got to watch mommy win the whole darn thing!
Well this year, after her doing the Chicago and NYC Marathons in October and November, she opted to just do the half. I was not in the best shape ever and have been dogging it since Chicago (I've picked things up a bit since Thanksgiving). I finally decided to throw my hat in the ring and signed up for the half. I was hoping for a 1:35, but I really had no clue what level of fitness I had. Leading up to the race, I put in a few 4-5 mile runs and finally ran 10 the Sunday prior to the race. Needless to say, I probably wasn't properly trained for a PR, but I was hoping to start at a reasonable pace (7:20ish) and pick it up the last three or so if I had anything left in the tank.

The weekend began Friday night with a pretty decent sized crew heading to the beach. In all, we had 4 other guys we run with stay at the family condo in Ocean City. We also knew quite a few other "XMP'ers" were running so since it's a relatively small race, we had a pretty good representation at the RB Marathon. We drove down and arrived just past 7 at packet pickup. We got our packets, Brad switched from the full to the half with no issue (out of our 6, 4 of us would do the half and 2 would do the full). It just so happened the Italian restaurant directly next to pickup was having a "marathon special" with pasta and a beer for $15. Obviously we had to take advantage of the offer. The food was pretty good, the beer cold, the company fantastic. Post dinner, we were on our way to Ocean City to unpack and hit the rack. We had a 7am gun time so not much time to fool around.
Wake up call was about 5 (the alarm was 5:30, but the guys were plenty vocal to get us moving). Threw down a bagel, mixed up some EFS with Pre-Race and drove to Rehoboth. We got a spot close to the start but opted to sit in the car for a bit. The forecast called for a low of 28, but we were pleasantly surprised to wake up to mid 40s - perfect race weather. I decided no throw-away top was necessary and went with short sleeves, gloves, and beanie.

We made our way to the bathroom and then race start. The half and full both start and finish at the same spot and we made our way to close to the front. Soon enough, after the National Anthem, the gun went off and we were off running. I settled into just under a 7:30 pace for the first two and when we hit the third mile I was shocked to see my Garmin at 2.75...huh??? I just assumed that we'd make that difference up as we went along, but I assumed wrong. It appears that the entire race turned on an out and back too early. While this was a well organized race, there were spots on the course that could have been marshalled much better (more on this to come). Oh well, not much I could do about the discrepancy and I just figured it would work itself out in the end. After all, I wasn't after a PR so I would just run by feel and hope I had something in the tank after 10 miles or so.
The half and full marathoners run together for the first nine miles and then the halfers turn around and head back. This was the first time I'd be able to gauge Chrissy's situation. While I knew she would have a shot to win the overall, you can't control who shows up so the win wasn't guaranteed. I hit mile 8 and figured I would be seeing her soon and a few minutes past the 8 mile mark, she and Brad were heading back to the finish. I gave her a shout of encouragement and then a few seconds later I saw the #2 woman. I yelled back to Chrissy she had about 10 seconds on #2 just to let her know (it was probably a bit more than that, but running my own race, 10 seconds seemed about right to me at the time. After that, it seemed like it took quite some time to get to the turn around, but I finally hit it and headed for home.
I ended up running probably 5-6 miles along side a 16 year old kid running his first half. He was shooting for a 1:40 and I told him at about 10 that we were going to hit 1:35 if he could hold on. He said he'd never run more than 11 (sounds like my first 10 miler experience). We hit 11 and I told him if he could run the final two in 15 minutes we'd easily be under 1:35. As we hit 12, I pulled away a bit from the kid and hoped he'd hang in there. As I made my way to the finish, there was an older guy up ahead with about a half mile to go. I made it my goal to catch him which I soon did. Then, I spotted a girl soon after. I wanted to try to catch her too. Despite the spectator yelling to her to not let the guy catch her, I did with maybe a quarter mile to go. There was no one else in the area so I was in pure "hold on for dear life" mode. I finally saw the finish and crossed in 1:32:39 for a PR...sort of. My Garmin showed 12.89. So, it seems we turned around a bit too early at mile 2.5ish. My wife, Brad, and Dan were all at the finish. My wife took the title! She ran a 1:25:09 and won by :39. Man she's awesome! Brad took 4th in the 35-39 age group, but was pacing Chrissy. Dan got 3rd in the 40-44. I ended up 9th which I'll take any day of the week!
We decided to head to the car and get some clothes on and then head over to the 21 mile mark to see if we could cheer on Ken, Jeff, and Greg. I gunned it over to the area and we worried we may have missed at least Ken. We were lucky and hadn't missed anyone...including the leader (we called these guys Team Beard pre-race - there were a few of them all bearded out).

A pic of Brad and Dan with THE WINNER! as we waited.

And eventually Ken came running by...

Oh yeah...one with me :) Go Team reGen! Ha!

We decided to wait in the car for a bit to see Greg and Jeff, and almost missed Greg entirely! We saw him (while we were in the car), and luckily stuck our heads out in time to give him a yell! He later said that gave him the energy to score his first sub 3 hour marathon! But as we waited for Greg, an unfortunate incident happened. As we sat in the car, I noticed another guy turn up into the neighborhood instead of continuing further down the road and onto the trail. The course at this point was NOT properly lined or marshalled! I jumped out of the car and yelled at the guy he was going the wrong way and he eventually got on the trail...hopefully only losing a few seconds. That was the only poor portion of the race (that we knew of). I guess that comes with the territory with smaller races. We waited another few minutes for Jeff and then realized we might miss Ken finish so we jetted towards the finish and find out we just missed Ken. Doh! Oh well, we saw Greg and Jeff finish and then we headed back to the condo to clean up and get back for the awards.

Soon enough we were back to the awards party, grabbed some food, awards, beer, and then were headed home. Another successful race for Team Graham (especially the female contingent)!

And one of me holding some more of the victors spoils...

Now it's back to the grind and time to train for some spring races!

Turkey Burnoff Race Report

I decided to do our club race Saturday post Thanksgiving. They had a 5 mile and 10 mile race. Despite running with the club the past couple years, we've never done a "club" race. I have to say there definitely will be more of these in the future. They are very low key, and best of all, FREE for club members. We had to pay a $5 deposit for our chip but then we use the same chip/bib for all club races. I have to say that's a pretty damn good deal. My wife ran the Turkey Chase 10k Thursday morning...and as has become the norm, she crushed it, winning her age group and placing 7th overall. She also came close to breaking 40 minutes! Only 11 more seconds to go and she's there. On a faster course she would have crushed it!

Onto Saturday...the whole family went and my daughters ran the fun run with my wife. My 5 year old gets a total kick out of racing and my 7 year old would much rather be in bed or watching cartoons... The race was in a local state park and it was flippin' hilly! Ugh. I was hoping to run a 6:45 pace, but after mile one, I knew that wasn't happening. Everyone else we run with was running the 10 miler so it was tempting to double up, but I decided I would see what I could do with the 5 miler and hope that I could bang out my goal time. Well, the course was tougher than I expected (at least for my current level of fitness), but I managed a 34:32ish (no start mat so just gun time and that's what my Garmin said :) ). About a 6:52 pace so fairly close to what I was hoping for. I think it's a good kick in the rear for me to get back at it and start working on things for the spring. Oh yeah...on a related note, I've been training with a heart rate monitor and raced with it Saturday. Definitely is taking some getting used to, but hoping this will help lead to big improvements!

Post race, we hit the car and loaded a back pack up with reGen and headed back to the finish to watch all of our crew roll in. By the end, we must have given out 5 or 6 cases of reGen! The word is definitely spreading!

Oh yeah..."star sighting" - Desiree Ficker ran the race (she grew up in my area) and easily won the women's 10 mile race. She made it look easy!

Thursday is a big day...Day 1 of Eagleman 70.3 prep. If all goes as planned, I will CRUSH my time of 5:41 from last year. Can.Not.Wait!

Parks Half Marathon Race Report

Yesterday was the Parks Half Marathon. This takes place in Rockville, MD from the Rockville Metro running mostly down trails through Rock Creek Park to downtown Bethesda. Rumor had it that the course may be a bit under water/mud, but I had a set goal in mind and a PR to shoot for. In four weeks I will be running the Chicago marathon and my goal is to technically qualify for the Boston Marathon with a 3:15:59 or better. Chances are this will be way too late to actually get into Boston, but the ability to technically say I BQ'd (for this year at least - next year qualifying is 5:59 faster - or 3:10 or better for my age group). With this in mind, I wanted to run about a 7:15 pace for a half marathon hoping this would put me close to being able to run about a 7:30 pace in Chicago (I will need to officially run about a 7:28 pace to be 3:15:59 or better). I lined up with the 1:35:00 pacer (7:14 pace) and basically wanted to try and hold on as long as I could. The first couple miles were a bit quick, but there was some downhills that helped keep the pace up. At mile three there is a steep short hill dubbed the "silencer" and the pace slowed down a bit. This was also evident in mile four and somewhere around the third or fourth mile I decided to pick up the pace a bit and I pulled away from the group. I maintained a sub 7:10 pace for the next couple miles and then had a slower seventh mile and I began to wonder if I would fall off a bit. I knew I had some time in the bank, but I would still need to do work to hit 1:35 or better. At about 6.5 I opened my Gu Roctane and began to "sip" on it hoping for a water stop to come up. It seemed to take a bit to find that stop so eventually I took the whole gel. Soon after I was able to down it with some water and perhaps this allowed me to pick things up and maintain my pace. I seemed to be fairly steady/consistent throughout and by mile 10 I was ahead of pace by a bit and would most likely definitely hit my goal unless the wheels decided to fall off. I was hoping to hold on until I hit mile 11 and then pick it up for the final two. Well, this didn't quite happen, but I maintained close to my 7:15 pace I was looking for and when I hit mile 12, I slowly began picking up the pace. The Parks Half Marathon runs along a trail I am very familiar with. My running group routinely runs portions of this race so I know where I am and how much I have to go through much of the race. There is about a quarter mile of tunnel you run through just towards the end and I finally started to put the hammer down (for me anyway). I wanted to be a bit faster here, but my gut was telling me, "push any harder and you will have a visitor." I did manage to put a final push down and pass a few people and only one person was able to hammer it past me down the final stretch so I am ok with that (I think I could have picked it up a bit to hang on with him, but I was almost positive I would have puked and it may have been prior to the finish). I crossed the line in an official time of 1:33:47 beating my goal by over a minute and about a 5 minute 30 second PR. I'll take it!

Post race I caught up with my wife who incidentally just went out, 4 minute PR'd, AND won her age group (8th female overall as well). One day I'll catch her...maybe. I also met up with my cousins and a bunch of friends. This is a point to point race so I wasn't able to bring a bunch of reGen (or any reGen) but my buddy actually had one for me! That definitely hit the spot.

I'm sore today, but hoping to catch a few recovery miles. To be determined... I also have to treat my plantar faciaitis issue. It is definitely flaring up post race! Ouch!

On to CHICAGO!!! 3:15 or bust!!!