I Ran, I Bonked, I Conquered
Cliff notes: second marathon in 5 weeks, a PR by almost 2 minutes despite some utter BS unnaceptable race situation and a serious bonk. 3:05:28 9/223 overall, 2/18 in age group.
Last Sunday, 5 weeks after my Tyler marathon debut, I ran a second marathon, the Fort Worth Marathon. I usually give a play by play on every mile but this time I’ll do something a bit different. I’ll do the race report as a friend usually does and give you the good the bad and the ugly.
The Good
1) Weather. Race day weather could not have been any more perfect. Temperature started at 37F and climbed to 56F by the finish. It was awesome. I wore shorts, a racing singlet, a hat with visor and some $0.99 gloves that I was planning to throw away which I did at mile 15. There was no wind for the most part and a gentle 2-3 mph breeze on the way back.
2) Race size and location. The race was a local race for me, I made it to the start from my house in 25 minutes and I parked 200 yards from the finish line. There were 250 or so entrants and 223 finishers in the marathon distance, 300 runners in the half and a 100 runners in the 20 mile “race” which is really advertised as a long run before the Dallas White Rock marathon that’s in 3 weeks.
3) Post race meal and support. The race finished at the Fort Worth Cats baseball stadium and they had plenty of water, bananas, oranges, hot dogs, fajitas and even beer. There was a small race day expo with vendors doling out Honey Milk and other stuff too. They had a massage tent that was giving post race sport massages to runners with at least half a dozen beds going.
4) Finisher’s medal. It’s a simple medal that is on a string that is connected with Velcro so it can be removed and the medal doubles as a belt buckle making it actually useful for something for once. This is one medal you can wear out in public.
5) Pre-race nutrition. I carb loaded for two days straight and gained 5 lbs of glycogen and water in the process. I ate lots of pastries and pasta and felt really good and ready on race day.
6) Course. I run this course weekly with my running group, I am familiar with every turn and it felt great to run on familiar territory. Although I have to be honest; under race conditions your perception of the route changes and, especially towards the end, the mile markers just can’t come soon enough. The course had a total of 100 ft of climb going out and 60 ft of climb coming back making it a super flat course. There was one tough climb at a low water crossing at mile 9.3 going out and mile 17 coming back respectively but it didn’t feel too bad when I was on it, I was still flying.
7) Company. I ran the first 17 miles with my training partner, Todd. He’s a master runner and while he refused to commit to a goal time prior the race he said we should do a 6:45 pace out to bank a small amount of time for my sub 3 goal and see what happens on the way back. We were at the half way point at 1:28:45, a new half marathon PR for me, which meant we ran a 6:46 split, right on the money. We clocked a couple more good splits on the way back from 13 miles and we were doing great by mile 17 where I tried to keep the pace as I felt Todd was slowing down so I left him only to see him pass by me at 25.5 miles. More on that later. We certainly had a good time together and the only regret I have is not sticking with him longer.
8 ) First 23 miles. For the first 17 miles with Todd we did great. Then I pulled a away and maintained a solid pace for the next 6 miles on my own. I was at mile 23 at 2:36:29, well under schedule for my sub 3 goal. I ran a 6:48 pace up until this point which meant I only needed a 7:20 pace for the last 3.2 miles. As you can see that did not happen.
9) Family at the finish. In Tyler my family set up camp at a playground which we ran past at mile 16 and mile 25. This time they showed up at the finish line and saw me finish. My wife was actually not very happy with what she saw. She said I looked terrible and she was concerned whether I was OK or not and whether I needed medical help or not. She didn’t understand that looking the way I looked is absolutely normal for a marathon finish. She also had a hard time with understanding that I as much as I wanted to sit down I couldn’t. I just had to stand and walk off the cramps before I could even attempt to sit down. It was really weird for her to see me in such a bad shape. She’s seen me finish 5K and 10K races before but never a marathon. It was a bit shocking and she much prefers to wave at me at the middle miles and see me at the finish 20-30 minutes after I finished and partially recovered.
10) Post marathon feelings. After Tyler in the finishing chute I swore up and down that I would never ever run another marathon in my life. Yet 5 weeks later here I am just finished another one. This time I did not have that feeling. This time I felt relief once I crossed the finish, in my finishing photos I look terrible but I did not despise the distance. I was actually quite OK with the notion that I will repeat the same thing in 3 weeks in Dallas, at a much slower pace mind you.
So that was the good part of the race, it’s time to discuss the bad part:
1) Route Markings. The race started from the parking lot of the ballpark and we had one of the veterans who ran the race the last three years show the route up to the trail. At one point we were supposed to climb up to the levee and Todd jokingly yelled “Last hill of the course!” to which one of the lead guys got confused and jumped over the railing and went the wrong way thinking Todd yelled at him for going the wrong way. I felt really bad for him. This could have been avoided if there were cones on the course. Once we were on the trail things were obvious to me as to which way to run, I ran the course dozens of times. But for people who were out of towners I could see how the course could have been confusing. And to boot there were no volunteers or cones for the half marathon and the 20 mile distances only some paint marks on the ground. But there are hundreds of paint marks on this trail, it seems like every running group and cyclist paints their own set of markers so unless you had a GPS and you knew that your turnaround was supposed to be pretty close you very well could have missed your turnaround. I know that another friend of mine was yelling at half marathoners who ran past their turnaround telling them they ran too far. This kind of mess up is totally unacceptable for any race especially for a race that’s in its 4th year.
2) Water. If you thought the markers were bad the water situation was simply unacceptable. After the start we had one water station at mile 1 where I got a cup that was not even quarter of a way filled, but I didn’t think much of it, we were only one mile into the race so I was fine with not taking on too much water. Little did I know what was coming…. At mile 2 the same situation repeated itself. I was a bit ticked that the cups were so ridiculously low on the water. I’m already a glass half empty kind of guy but these weren’t even half empty, they were 3/4 way empty. Todd, my buddy, didn’t even take on any water at this point thinking it’s too early in the game. And this is where the surprise came. There were no water stops after those two for the next 9 miles. I’m not kidding you! We had a friend of ours who’s nursing a plantar fasciitis injury standing by at mile 8 on the course yelling at us that “there is no water until mile 11″. I could not believe what I was hearing and I was already pretty pissed off about not having water for the last 6 miles by then. So Todd and I made the decision to actually stop at a water fountain that’s on the trail and try to get some water from that. So we made a quick pit stop at mile 8 and got about three sips of water from the fountain, definitely not enough. It cost us 15 seconds to stop and get that water. After the low water crossing at the 9.5 mile mark we ran into the family of our friend who were going to hand him some water and we finally got two nice 16 oz bottles of waters from them. Again, it cost me time to run to the other side of the street, raid their SUV for a water bottle and I just took what I could find. I drank about 1/3rd of it then Tood and I tossed our bottles to the side of the road so we’d have something on the way back. By the time we got back my bottle was gone; someone took it and drank it. At mile 11 we finally got some water and at mile 13.1 at the turnaround we had water again. Then we had water again at mile 15, then nothing for me until mile 19 where I stopped for water at the fountain, another 11 seconds I never got back. By then they had water stops set up on the rest of the course and there were strangers handing out bottles along the way as well. But at one of the stops where I actually wanted to drink they said “water is on the way”. What were they expecting me to do? Stop and wait until it got there? It was totally unacceptable for a race for 600 people not to have water on the course. I am not sure how much this water situation affected my time but it cost me at least 26 seconds in wasted time at the fountain not counting the other problems with the lack of water such as the next one.
3) Race nutrition. In Tyler I took a gel at 4 miles then another one at 8 and one last one at 12 after which I switched to Gatorade at the aid stations. For Fort Worth Marathon my plan was a gel at 4,8,12 and 16 then Gatorade to the finish. So at mile 3.5 I took the gel pack out of my pocket and I babied that freaking gel pack for the next 5 miles waiting for a water station. Once I took the three sips from the fountain I was too worried to take the entire gel pack so I only squeezed half of it in my mouth before I tossed it. So by mile 8 I had a half gel in me instead of the planned 2. Since I was still concerned about the water situation I didn’t take a gel until mile 15 and that was the only gel I took. So I had 1.5 gel packs instead of my planned 4 and I stuck with water for the rest of the race whenever I could get any, I was just glad that I found water let alone Gatorade. So my race nutrition was totally shot and I think this ultimately lead to the ugly part.
The ugly, AKA the bonk:
In Tyler I didn’t bonk. Sure I faded and ran my last 2 miles in the 7:50s but I did not bonk. Sure I felt tired and fatigued but I did not bonk. Today I bonked. And I bonked hard.
As you can see I was holding a very respectable and solid 6:48 average for the first 23 miles. I just wish it was a 23 mile race. Because what happened after that was just pure misery.
At mile 23 I knew I was getting in trouble. Mile 22 was 6:55 and mile 23 was 6:59. They were the first two splits that were outside of the 6:52 goal pace. I tried to do the math and I figured I still had a chance at the sub 3 if I could just hang in there. When I finished mile 24 with a 7:35 I knew that I had no chance at the sub 3. I knew that there was no way I could dig deep and run two more miles at 7:15 or faster. I mentally gave up that goal in an instant. All it took was one mile. And once that happened I started slipping even more. I was running 8 minute pace by then and the pace was deteriorating fast.
2) Walking. I took my first walk break at mile 24.3 for 35 yards as I walked through a, “gasp”, water station. After the water break I got into a 9:30 pace and held onto it for a while but things were painful. My legs weren’t moving and I felt like I was done with running. I seriously considered quitting. I actually felt that not only my sub 3 goal and my sub 3:03 goal (7:00 pace) were out the window but the chance of beating my Tyler time of 3:07:26 was out of the question too.
Once I reached the zero mile marker on the trail I knew that I had less than 2 miles to go. I had to cross two bridges and I walked the second one. I just had to walk again. So this was walk break number two lasting another 100 yards. I had one more 20 yard walk at mile 26 at which point I thought I would just walk the last 0.2 miles in. But I didn’t. I got going again and finished the race running. So I walked a total of 150 yards and I’m not proud of it.
3) Getting passed. Getting passed is never fun. But getting passed by slow runners is just ridiculous. I don’t have anything against slow runners but I don’t know how to describe the feeling I got in the last mile when I was getting passed by half marathoners on the way to the finish. These were half marathoners who started an hour behind us so they were the 2 hour half marathon group meaning they were the ones who averaged 9:09 minutes/mile for the 13.1 mile distance. And I was getting my ass kicked by them at the end of my marathon. Their kind and encouraging words of “hang in there, you’re almost there” did not help one bit. I know full well they were words of genuine encouragement but at the moment they felt like insults. I felt like replying to them and telling them to just STFU and mind their own business and I ran 13.1 miles more than they have but luckily I didn’t even have the energy to say anything so I just kept my mouth shut and tried to finish the race at an embarrassingly slow pace.
4) Getting passed by Todd with one km to go. Todd caught up with me with about 1km to go and he told me to hang in there and go with him but I could barely keep myself upright at the time. He beat me by 31 seconds. He had terrible muscle cramps past mile 21 when he had to walk a bit himself yet he still finished with a respectable pace instead of crawling trough on all fours like I almost did. And the thing is that Todd is still probably in a lot better shape tonight than I am with an impeding tendinitis of my left foot.
So there you have it. That is my Fort Worth Marathon race report. It was a good race, I ran a solid effort for the first 23 miles at which point I practically died. Could I have run strong longer had I fueled better and had I had more water in me in the first half of the race? I don’t know. It is what it is and there is nothing to do about it now. I still beat my marathon PR by 1:58 and I also got a shiny new half marathon PR of 1:28:45 out of this race. Even with the nasty and ugly last couple of miles I think it was a successful race and I’m honestly not sure if I would do anything different. Maybe I would stick with Todd a bit longer and not let me get ahead of myself just because I felt good at the time.
Splits:
1 06:32.0
2 06:43.5
3 06:39.8
4 06:48.2
5 06:44.9
6 06:49.8
7 06:49.2
8 06:48.3
9 06:55.4 – 15 seconds of water fountain break
10 06:48.9
11 06:46.3
12 06:46.0
13 06:40.0
14 06:48.1
15 06:51.4
16 06:56.4
17 06:47.3
18 06:59.2 – 11 seconds of water fountain break
19 06:43.1
20 06:48.4
21 06:48.8
22 06:55.0
23 06:59.7
24 07:35.3
25 09:49.0
26 09:47.0
26.2 01:47.0 (8:55 pace)
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A week ago