Race information
Goals
| Goal | Description | Completed? |
|---|
| A | 03:45:00 | No |
| B | < 4 hours | Yes |
| C | Finishing uninjured | Yes |
Preface
I have been running long-distances for about three years now, did multiple half's with a PR of 01:42:43. I had my marathon debut on the 29th of January '16, and it was a terrible debut. I finished in 04:59:52, having crashed badly in the second half. I hit the wall pretty badly before the 30th Kilometer (~ 18.5 miles) While having finished 16 weeks of solid training, it wasn't enough to meet any of my goals which were best goal (finishing sub 3:45), great goal (finish sub 4), good goal (finishing strong without stopping). I was following a training plan from Garmin Connect, and chose the intermediate marathon plan, with HRM, meaning I would do my runs based on time and heart rate only.
I followed the plan as religiously as I could, but I should have know that my average paces were much slower than my target marathon pace, but I neglected that in thought that I'm building an aerobic base, and you can't go too slow. Well, apparently for me, I could go too slow.
So following my disaster on the 29th of January, I sat out to avenge for my brutal first marathon and signed up to run the Hamburg Marathon on the 17th of April.
Training
I bought 'Hanson's Marathon Method' and decided to run the last 9 weeks of the beginner program. I took a few days off after the first marathon, then slowly began building miles, until I began my mini training cycle on the 15th of February. The transition from running 4/5 times a week to 6 times wasn't bad, as I truly enjoy running, this was something I was looking forward to.
Over the past 9 weeks, I have stopped limiting myself to training by heart rate. I still wear a heart-rate monitor, but it does not dictate, it only reports. Temperate and humidity and caffeine levels and fatigue and sleep and rest are all variables that can alter heart rate a lot from day to day, and I don't think it is a very accurate metric to gauge intensity by. Perceived effort will always prevail.
Now for those of you who are unfamiliar with the Hanson's Marathon Method training plans, well, the biggest surprise about their schedules (for both Beginner & Advanced versions), is that the long run maxes out at 16 miles (~25.5 km). Their training philosophy revolves around accumulated fatigue by concentrating on total running volume, but that's beyond the scope of this post.
Total Kilometers during 9 week training after the first marathon (& 2 weeks recovery): 623.6 Kilometers (387,4 miles)
Race strategy
My best goal coming into the race was finishing in 03:45:00 or under, which meant I had to sustain an average pace of 5:20 min/km (8:35 min/km), which seemed pretty attainable seeing that I had been averaging 5:06 min/km and 5:04 min/km on two different 16 km tempo runs.
I read on the race's website that there will be two pacemakers for multiple finishing times, 3 hours 45 minutes being on them. So I made up my mind that I should stick with those for the first half or up to the 30 km mark, and then see if I can hit the gas some more.
Pre-race
The race being at 9 AM, I woke up at 5:47 AM (I had this time saved on my alarm lists and it was the closest thing to 5:50, so why not) and had my breakfast which consisted of a couple of toast slices with peanut butter, a banana, black tea and water.
My buddy and I then checked out of the hostel and hit the public transportations to get to the start point exactly two hours before the race (The earliest I've ever been, but since there were 16,200 runners participating, I did not want to risk getting late)
Race
I've never run in such a big scaled race before, so it was pretty overwhelming being surrounded by this many enthusiasts like myself all at the same time. I had been assigned to Block E, which was according to the estimated finishing time I gave during registration. Now I was naive and adrenaline-pumped enough to type in a 03:30:00 finishing time. I was asking the marshalls where will the pacemakers for 3hrs45mins would be, but they were clueless of those, some even thought that I was talking about pacemakers for the elites (I wish).
So I went to the back of the Block E coral, and I overheard someone asking the ladies holding the line which separates block F from E about the same thing (they also had no idea), but eventually he spotted the ballon with the time some 10 meters behind him or so. So I slid beneath the rope and moved back in the Block F coral.
A big and loud count down and off we were, it wasn't until 5 minutes after official time where our pact crossed the starting line and began the journey.
Kilometers [1] to [7]
This portion of the race was against headwind coming from the west, but to be honest I did not feel it due to the sheer amount of runners ahead of me. I set myself to be as near as possible to the pace maker, but tried to stay near the blue line as well, which is the shortest way to the finish. I noticed that pace maker was not concentrating on that much so I tried when I could.
The first Kilometer went in 5:19 which is spot-on pacing for the target, then 5:05 for the second, and from there more or less even with the following Kilometer splits being 5:22, 5:16, 5:18, 5:10, and 5:14 respectively.
I expected the pacer maker to be more evenly-paced than that, but it didn't matter because we were cruising without issues. Also, I had my first energy gel at the 40 minutes mark approximately, downed it with some water.
Kilometers [8] to [12]
Decided to get closer to the pacemaker and start converse a little bit, since I was geeky enough to remember the names of the pacemakers for 3hr45mins. The effort was still feeling pretty moderate, with conversations being easily maintained. I made friends along the route and had some lovely insights from locals, one of them being like the pacemaker herself.
The route had a slight downhill and the rest of the segment was mostly flat Splits were also on the faster end of the target [in min/km]: 5:16, 5:11, 5:09, 5:04, 5:05.
Kilometers [13] to [21.1]
The Kilometers kept ticking by, myself hardly noticing the effort or the distance, really enjoying every bit of the awesome cheering crowds, the great sunny and chilly weather, the different bands playing at different points of the course, the kick-ass people having a small loud parties from their balconies.
Pace-wise, we were going faster than our target pace, we even clocked a 4:45 minutes Kilometer. We crossed the half-marathon point in 1:49:47, which is almost three minutes ahead of target finishing time, but again, I was feeling great and did not see how it might go wrong.
Splits (in min/km):
5:20, 5:13, 5:25, 5:12, 4:45, 5:21, 5:10, 5:13 and 5:07
Kilometers [21.1] to [29]
I kept cruising with the pacemaker who asked how I was doing, to which I replied 'great', and the rest of the group. She was doing an awesome job of pulling us through, even running ahead and getting water from aid stations for us, but she was going too fast for my target.
The uneven pacing started to creep in slowly into my legs and during a slow-down on one of the aid stations, a gap opened between me and the pace group, and I felt heavy to actually pull through and join them back. I was looking at my watch, which has an estimated finishing time upon setting distance and time goals, and seeing that I was 3 minutes ahead of target, I thought it was wiser to finally let go and run my own race.
Splits (in min/km):
5:05, 5:24, 5:04, 5:21, 5:21, 5:24, 5:31
Kilometers [30] to [42.195]
Now I don't know if it was actually the right move to let go of the pace group and run my own race, because having moral boost and/or mental simulation by conversing is really helpful at rough times.
Things started to get slow and choppy in this portion of the race, which is normally interpreted by the dreaded two words 'THE WALL', but I managed to scrape through it, unlike my first marathon where I crashed badly.
I had two walk many times to catch myself, and I was feeling light-headed in a couple of spots in which I asked the medics for salt, but they didn't have any.
I must say, that having total stranger shout out your first name (from the bib, duh) is a powerful tool to keep digging deep. I can't remember how many times I kept on going just for the sake of a shout-out, or a kid putting his arm out for a high-five!
My best goal of finishing in 03:45:00 was beyond reach, but I knew I could still get the Sub-4 finish if I don't waste much time. I kept on running as much as I could, as fast I could.
A final kick in the home-stretch and I make it with a chip time of 03:56:29 (5:36 min/km average pace), which was and still is very satisfying for the time being.
Splits (in min/km): 5:36, 5:34, 6:44, 6:29, 5:37, 6:47, 5:45, 6:50, 6:04, 6:15, 6:59, 7:19, 5:56.
Post-race
After a slow painful walk to the medal distribution, we got into an even slower more painful queue of water cup supply in which I guzzled down to cups, slightly disoriented with what just happened. I then found the guy that helped me push through the last two kilometer, and we ended up also exchanging stories through the finisher's buffet.
The buffet handed soups, drinks, fruits (watermelon slices, banana's and grapes), and snacks like chocolate croissants and biscuits.
I ate as much as I could (which wasn't a lot), and left to grab my kitbag and wear my hoodie because I was freezing my ass off.
What's next?
REST, and a lot of it for sure. I've been on strict schedule-training mode since October 2015, and my so-called at my marathon debut had me in awe of pursing this goal. Now I planned at least two weeks of no structured running, with maybe a few runs later on with no target at all.
However, on the longer term, my next focus is going back to the half-marathon distance to break 1hr40mins, and I also want to race a 5K (never have!) to find out what my time would be like.
Pictures
TL;DR: Finished my second marathon (Hamburg) in 03:56:29 yesterday, after having run 04:59:52 last January on my first.
