C.: Well, it’s Sunday. Before I go fill in for Ralph at The Kennel while he tours with Beauty and the Blowfish, I’ll read chapter seventeen of my BFF’s autobiographical book about training for and competing in an Ironman distance triathlon. This is from d.c. scot’s manuscript BEYOND THE THIRTEENTH MILE: THE IRON MAN CHRONICLES.
CHAPTER 17: RUNNING ON EMPTY
1915 hours: Run course; mile 16:
Well, I’m still on course to beat 14 hours. I feel okay, but my feet still hurt. They’re beginning to feel numb, though. Even if I give it everything I have, I won’t beat my best marathon time. I did finish that race strong, however, even though I could hear that old Jackson Browne song in my head during the last part of the race. I even beat my goal by 48 seconds! I really was running on empty at the end of that race…
***
To paraphrase that quote machine, Yogi Berra:—90% of running is physical; the other half is all mental. Never is this truer than in a marathon. My third marathon was to be my best, by far. That may have been due to more intensive (speed) training on my part. I measured out a six-and-one-half-mile route beginning at my house and challenged myself never to take more than an hour to run it.
My average speed in this marathon was 6.53mph, giving credence to the motto ''you run like you train." My right knee had healed nicely, after only having to rest it for a little over a week, as I had already planned to do.
My new magnetic knee brace improved my time by about 30 seconds per mile. This, over 26.2 miles, resulted in a dramatic improvement over my time in my first two marathons. (To anyone with knee problems, a good brace is well worth the money you must spend on it.) Also, a new supplement that I had begun taking about six weeks before the marathon seemed to help me recover faster from long runs and bricks. I recovered from cycling and then running back-to-back more quickly when I included the supplement in my caloric intake for the day.
There is an old saying, "plan your run and run your plan," and for once, I had a plan. It didn't hurt that the weather also decided to cooperate on the day of the 2001 Houston Marathon. The temperature was in the low 50s, the sky was overcast, and, because the marathon's new sponsor wasn’t offering prize money, the field shrank from about 7500 runners in the two previous years to about 5000 for this year.
My plan was to pace on Adam for as long as I possibly could. Adam, a good friend of Nicole's and mine, was running his first marathon, even though he was in his early 40s. However, Adam is a phenomenal natural athlete who can pick up on almost any sport in an instant. Running, it just so happened, proved to be Adam's natural sport. (He is also a very good cyclist.) Because his job required him to work overseas on a rotating schedule, this was the first year that Adam's work schedule allowed him to be in town for the marathon, and he intended to make the most of this opportunity. Adam had planned his run in even more minute detail than I had, writing his goals for his run splits on his arm. He wanted to qualify for the Boston Marathon, the world championship, while running his first marathon, so he planned accordingly.
I paced on Adam for as long as I possibly could, to the 13-mile marker. At that point, I knew I couldn't stay with him any longer. Adam was set on getting negative splits. Since he was running each mile a little faster than the one before, his pace had become faster than I could run and still finish the whole marathon. My goal was to have even splits, running each mile at the same pace.
Adam went on to run his negative splits until mile 22, after we both started on about a nine-minute-per-mile pace. That is about as fast as I usually run my long training runs. We even passed Joseph, although his plan was to run only half of the marathon. We still passed him before he had quit running. We also passed Jim and his wife, both of whom were capable of qualifying for the Boston Marathon. I hadn’t seen Jim, though, since we finished Buffalo Springs Lake with the same official time. That made me feel better about my time, since Jim had more experience as both a runner and a triathlete than I did.
Jim and Jill did pass me later, somewhere around the 20-mile mark. I almost caught back up with them after they decided to take a restroom break, but I didn't have enough energy left. To be honest, both Joseph and Jim were nursing nagging injuries that had been lingering for months; otherwise, I probably never would have seen either of them.
To reiterate, running is not my first love. I often ride extra miles on my bike or take extra laps in the pool to cut back on the amount of running I must do to keep up my training routine and get maximum cardiovascular benefits out of it. Distance running is far down the list for me as far as things I enjoy. However, getting in shape for a marathon is a good way to maximize your training when it’s too cold to swim outside and too windy to cycle.
Somewhere around mile 20, though, I must have hit the ultimate "runner's high." I was in an unrealistic state of euphoria brought on by a massive release of endorphins—natural painkillers—after running a long distance. I'm going to set a personal record by an hour, I thought as I glanced at my watch. Forget four hours, I want to try to qualify for the world championship in Boston! My brain may have released the endorphins efficiently, but it wasn’t working correctly in regard to reasoning.
Even elite distance runners (i.e. those who qualify for the Boston Marathon and vie for the world championship of marathon racing) don't escape reality. I’m not an elite runner! I was no exception to that rule. Not many marathon runners escape "hitting the wall" either. All my physical reserves were depleted at mile 23.
“I've got nothing left, I thought at that point. A quick glance at my watch, however, along with some simple math, told me that I still had a chance of hitting my goal of four hours. But, I reflected, It will take everything I have left in me.
Then again, what's the point of having aggressive goals if those goals don't require that you give your all to meet them? With this thought in mind, I started to run as hard as I could. I felt no cramps and my knee was fine, but I was really, really tired. At mile 24, I caught a slight chill, a sure sign of dehydration. That's not good, I thought, trying to force down as much water and sports drink as I could. By mile 25, I knew that the only way I could finish in less than four hours was to skip the last aid station and run as hard as I possibly could. Coming off the last hill (that infamous place where I tried to quit two years before), I gritted my teeth and put every bit of energy I had left in my body into my run. Coming around the last turn, I could see the official clock.
At mile 26, I had exactly one minute to run 285 yards. That’s a piece of cake under ordinary circumstances, but no mean feat after having run 26 miles. I started into (I thought) a dead out, no holds barred sprint. I passed under the finish line at four hours and 22 seconds, by the gun (from the time the starter's pistol sounded until I finished). However, my "chip time" (the time it took me to go from the starting line to the finish line, which was measured by an electronic chip fastened to my shoelace) was three hours, 59 minutes, and 12 seconds, 48 seconds faster than my goal.
Adam finished just ten minutes before I did, admitting that he, too, had "hit the wall" at mile 23. He had walked most of the last three miles, the only reason I finished as close to him as I did. Clearly, for the last three miles, we were both "running on empty. "
I never realized how true that statement was until Adam, Nicole, and I went to lunch with some of our friends who had come to support Adam and me. One, a veteran marathon runner who had chosen to sit this one out, looked me squarely in the eye and said, "Boy, Jed, coming around that last turn you looked as if you had absolutely, positively nothing left, and all you wanted to do was get across that finish line."
Truer words were never spoken.
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