What was the secret, they wanted to know; in a thousand different ways they wanted to know The Secret. And not one of them was prepared, truly prepared, to believe that it had not so much to do with chemicals and zippy mental tricks as with that most unprofound and sometimes heartrending process of removing, molecule by molecule, the very tough rubber that comprised the bottom of his training shoes.
It's only been 2 months since I ran the USAF Marathon and I'm finally getting around to writing about it. All it took was getting sick on a TDY to San Diego to give the free time to do it. So where do I begin a journey that consisted of running over 325 miles and taking about 52 hours of my time if you include the biking, swimming and other crosstraining that I did along the way. If you know me, you know I'm anal about things and I have an excel spreadsheet to track all of my workouts. What isn't included is all of the time spent warming up, cooling down stretching and generally getting ready to get out the door. So now I know where to begin. I better thank my wife Chris. She put up with my already long hours at work, which allowed me to do my weekday runs before I came home. She (being the morning person that she is), let me get out of the house early on the weekends so that I could get a long run in before it got over 90 degrees outside with the humidity to match. So Chris, thank you for letting me scratch one off of my bucket list. I love you. Next stop Kona.
I don't know exactly when I decided I was going to run the marathon, but I started tracking workouts on 17 Jun 2010. It may have been the email I got asking if anyone wanted to go on a TDY to run the AF Marathon, that's another story I'll get to later. I thought "Why not, I've been wanting to run one anyways". This would fill in the weak link in my Ironman pipedream, as I've never ran anything longer than a 15K, once. I found a 16 week training plan, (good thing the race was only 12 weeks away) and modified it to fit my schedule. Monday is crosstraining, T/TH is a tempo run of varying distance, W is a slow run just to add miles. Fr is an off day. Sat is the Long Run and Sun is a slow recovery run. So it would be for the next 12 weeks. As an incentive, my dear wife who knows that I'm a gadget geek at heart let me buy a super expensive GPS watch that does everything except run for you. I can wirelessly upload my workouts and you can tell what side of the street I was running on after it syncs up w/ Google Maps. The thing tracks, heartrate, elevation, pace (pick your format), cadence, laps and some other stuff I haven't figured out how to use yet. You can set it up to tell you that you are running too fast or slow. Your HR is too high or low, you need a drink and so forth. Playing with it (sts) during the long runs makes the time go by.
The funny thing about marathon training is that it's hard to run that many miles and not get hurt. I had some issues along the way. I started getting some mild shin splints as I pushed my first 25+ mile week. I got smart on running and switched to more of a mid/forefoot strike. I also joined the barefoot running cult. I you can run barefoot without hurting yourself then your form is correct, so the theory goes. Stepping on rocks doesn't count as hurting yourself. I'm talking knee, shin, hip problems etc. I also ended up taking about 2 weeks off in the middle due to the onset of Achilles tendinitis while I was TDY in Arizona. I kept the cardio up swimming and working out on an elliptical, but I didn't run for about 2 weeks. I found some strengthening exercises on the Runners World forum and rehabbed my tendon. I learned that ice doesn't really help me that much. I use iced on my shins and my Achilles tendon and they both got worse. The most important thing I learned was to listen to my body. Slow down on a hot day where you don't feel as good, but don't push it up on a day where you feel great because that will effect tomorrows workout. It's funny how pain makes you remember things better.
Anyhow, I replied to the email about the marathon and I guess I was the only one at Osan foolish enough to want run it. So as far as I knew, I was in like Flynn.
About 3 weeks before the race, I hadn't heard anything from the person running the team so I tracked him down on the global. Apparently they only had enough funds for 2 people, and I wasn't one of them. That sure as hell would have been nice to know, since now it was too late to sign up for the race. No problem, I figured. This is the AIR FORCE MARATHON. Surely they would make an exception for an active duty guy, flying in from Korea. The response I got was somewhere between _____ and _____. This is a family website, so I have to censor myself. Hey, there is a first time for everything. Needless to say I was a little aggravated. I had a Col call the race director to do some O-6 magic, no luck. So much for the little faith I had in Big AF, at least they validated my cynicism.
So once again, the good people at Runners World hooked me up. I started a thread about how to crash a race, but once again I'm getting ahead of myself. Did I mention that Chris's parents, her sister, her 2 kids, her new BF that we hadn't met yet and his kid were all going to meet us in Dayton? So race be damned, we were going to go to Dayton either way. Thus the thread about how to Gate Crash a race. If I'm there and spent all that time training, I'm going to run dammit. If you aren't in the know, serious runners frown upon Gate Crashing. I don't run for a finisher medal or a T-shirt, so I don't really care about an "Official Record" of my race time. I'll take personal satisfaction anyday. I got a lot of lectures from people, but I also got some really good tips and learned how to make a good knockoff bib once I've seen the official race bib. Good stuff to remember for later. Then someone suggested that I try and get onto a charity team. As I mentioned earlier, people always get hurt during training and there was a good chance that the various charities running the race have had some attrition. I got hooked up with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, and for a small donation, I was a legitimate entry. I had a hand written bib, hopefully the race director had to write it himself.
That wasn't as easy as it sounds. Apparently the whole time we were on the Patriot Express to Seattle, Mr Riggs, my POC with the charity was trying to get in touch with me. He contacted my Mother-in-Law Laura instead. He asked her to let me know that he'd made a mistake. He thought I wanted to run the Marine Corp Marathon not the AF Marathon, and he didn't have a way to get me into the race. Laura isn't one to put up w/ any BS. She filled him in on my story, I'm sure it took her 30 minutes to tell it, she is Chris's mother. She finally told him that she wasn't going to pass on that message, he'd have to tell me himself. He called her back later to tell her that he was able to get a spot in the race for me. Go Laura. So after landing, scrambling to get a useable cellphone, fax some papers and make a donation, I was ready to race. Except I still had to travel to Dayton, which as mostly uneventful.
Raceday
The race started at 0730, that meant we needed to be there by 0530 to make sure I found my way to the starting line before the race started. Chris and Erica handled the girls, and my new asshole-at-arms Mike got up early and rode to the race with me. I just met the guy 2 days ago, other than what Erica says about him via Facebook. Things were going well until I realized he was wearing a UF jacket. What in the hell is she doing w/ this guy? I guess we all have our faults.
Other than that, there was a lot of standing around trying to stay warm until the race started. I had the foresight to buy a cheap $4.00 sweatshirt at Walmart to throw away 1/4 mile down the road after the race started. That $4.00 sweatshirt cost me $125 before I could drag Chris, kicking and screaming, out of Wamart.
But I digress, the weather was perfect. Almost no humidity, at least not compared to Korea and it was in the low 50's. Temperature has a huge effect on running. As the temperature drops, you can run faster with he same amount of perceived effort. I knew this ahead of time and still tried to keep my pace to a turtle like 9:00 mile, despite wanting to takeoff. I compromised after the first and only big hill and began holding about and 8:30 to 8:45 pace except for a few downhills where I left my stride open up. I made it to the 10 mile point before Chris and the girls started looking for me. They saw me on the way out of the town though, and the girls had a fun time being cheerleaders for all of the runners.
All was going really well, I had my mp3 player blasting. I hate running in earplugs, so I got a Walkman that has a built in speaker. I was labeled "music guy" by some dude that kept pace with me throughout most of the race. I think he was intrigued when it went from Johnny Cash to GWAR. You can't help but run fast to Nitro Burnin Funny Bong. I eavesdropped on a few conversation, provided some peanut gallery comments to others, but for the most part I stayed in my little zone and just kept putting one foot in front of the other. I made it to the 1/2 way point in 1:54 which included a minute or two to stop in pee behind some bushes.
If you want to know how accurate these GPS watches are, you can actually tell where I ran behind the bushes when you open up the satellite imagery.
I was initially trying for a 4+00 marathon but decided that I'd try to push it up and go for 3+45 since I felt good at the halfway point. That was probably a mistake. About mile 17 I felt the familiar tingle of an impeding cramp on my inner quad. The only other time I'd felt it was during a bike race when I was trying to go too fast, up hill without training for the race. Both times, I got some serious cramps, this time would be no different. I kept running, thinking it would go away on it's own. About 10 minutes later, I was stopped on the side of the road, rubbing out a full blown locked up leg. I got it loosened up and continued, and the began to feel the same tinge in my other leg, this is going to be fun. I tried to massage it while I kept running but didn't have much luck. I changed my strategy from slow and steady to sprinting until my legs cramped then rubbing them until it stopped, rinse, repeat. I grabbed a banana and an 800Mg Ibuprofen at the aid station at mile 19. You gotta love military strength Motrin.
Coming down the hill after mile 20 I heard Laura and Jerry saying something, I was pretty much blocking everything out at that point. Then I heard Chris and she was bringing me a banana. I didn't have the heart to tell her I just had one and could only eat 1/2 of it so I gave her a kiss and took the banana. Somewhere around 22 miles I did some math and figured if I could hold 8:00/mile for the last four I could salvage my 4+00 goal. Needless to say, as much as my lungs were OK with that my legs said otherwise. I managed to pick up the pace for a little bit but locked up for about the 20th time. Resigned to merely finishing as I saw 4+00 tick by on my watch, I continued on, cramps and all. I crossed the line at 4:08:50. Not bad for my first marathon considering I really had no idea what time to shoot for. Most runners will tell you if you finish your first one in one piece, consider it a success. I'm satisfied, not happy, so that provides some motivation for the next one. In Seoul. 20 Mar 2011.
Aside from being really sore for the next few days, messing up the bottom of my left foot (self diagnosed it as cuboid syndrome), rubbing a hole in the side of my right shoe from an old scar scrapping against the side of it, and getting a black toenail that is finally about to fall off. I'm fine.
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