Amsterdam Marathon 2016

Sunday, October 16, 2016. Amsterdam. 26.2 miles (or, 42.2 kilometers. I spent a good portion of the race contemplating the odd sync-up that led to the decimals being the same even though the miles and kilometers are so different.. didn't really come up with anything but it was a good distraction).

But I'm getting ahead of myself!  This was my (Austin, Celebration, Cologne, Margaritas and Manure 50k, Shawnee) 6th marathon. Between the transcontinental move, the crazy summer that work promised to be, and generally feeling burnt out on the idea of running really fast, I decided to take a much easier approach to training and the race in general. I followed the Hal Higdon 'Novice 1' plan, which had zero speed work in it. I also skipped most of the cross-training, although a move to the Netherlands dramatically upped my biking mileage most days.

Overall I was pretty consistent with my training. The plan only had one 20 miler in it, which I turned into a super-fun 21-mile run to Rotterdam one beautiful Saturday morning. My pace for that was a consistent 10:30/mile, which was also my pace for most of my other runs. Slow and steady. Periodically throughout training I'd marvel at past training cycles when I was aiming for a 8:40 race pace, but this was where I was in 2016. I also switched from Altras to Hoka One Ones partway through the training, which somewhat alleviated foot pain I've been dealing with most of the year, although post-long-run most weeks my feet were still making me pretty unhappy.

All that to say, that race-wise I was ready for a fun jaunt around Amsterdam, but probably not as physically prepared as I have been for other races - mentally though, I've been around this block before and knew what to expect!

Taper week also coincided with a visit from two awesome friends from America-land. They came in on Monday morning and we spent Tuesday wandering all over Brugge, Belgium and sampling a suite of the offerings from De Halve Mann brewery. Not a restful taper-kind of day but a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I did my best to make up for it over the rest of the week, and opted out of several dinners out and sightseeing.

Saturday morning, Travis and our friends explored The Hague a bit more, while I sat with my feet up and watched Gilmore Girls. Then we walked to the train station and took a train into Amsterdam, followed by a tram to the race expo. I started to get extremely excited as we walked towards the expo, seeing all the people carrying Mizuno bags. I realized that between the move and the culture differences, I've done almost all my training in complete isolation - it was amazing to suddenly see so many other people who had also trained for months and were going to do the same crazy thing as me the next morning!  The Expo was pretty great - picking up my packet and getting my shirt were seamless and the shirt is super cute. After a few rounds around the stalls, we (impulsively) hopped in a cab to get to our AirBnB - I was done walking!  Our AirBnB was a small apartment near a tram stop and the race start, and a bit to the west of the city center.  It was cozy with a very comfy couch - so I resumed my morning activity of sitting with my feet up, watching Gilmore Girls, while Travis and our friends headed out to see Amsterdam!

I laid my clothes out, ate leftover pineapple rice that I'd brought from our house, and eventually decided it was bed time. I actually slept really well, and it was even more restful knowing that I didn't need to leave our apartment until 8:40 the next morning!

Race morning dawned! Banana + peanut butter + yogurt for breakfast, and then we headed out the door! Travis had my sunglasses to offer to me when I ran past him later. I had my handheld water bottle with lots of Gu (imported from America, of course!), a date-and-pecan bar, and tons of salt tabs. No music, no phone. We walked about a mile to the Amsterdam Olympic Stadium, home of the 1928 Summer Olympics. Our designated 'okay, meet me here after the race!' spot was a little brick building near the 500m-to-go banner - having figured out that detail, I headed off to try to find my way in!

My first stop was a giant crowd. Eventually this funneled into the tunnel entering the stadium. As we passed into the stadium the people I was moving with started cheering our way in, which gave me chills- so much excitement! It felt so triumphant, just to enter and begin the final wait. Once inside I found the 'green' starting area and immediately got in line for the PortaPotties. I chatted with an Italian man (he spoke no English, I speak no Italian, but we managed to exchange pleasantries and  humanity).  The race began with much cheering, and over the tops of people's heads I could see a large video screen showing Kenyans and Ethiopians heading out of the stadium. I stayed in line, inching slowly forward and wondering whether I'd reach the toilet before my corral emptied.  Periodically, more cheers would erupt as another wave of runners was released (there were 16,500 people registered for the marathon alone!) Happily, I DID make it to the bathroom and had a few minutes to spare before my wave began. We slowly walked/jogged around a quarter of the track and then suddenly, in front of me was the starting line!  The clock already said something around 40:00, so it took quite a while for us to get to the start.

And suddenly, we were off! It was so much fun to suddenly feel like I was doing something with so many others instead of running all alone as I had for my entire training cycle.  The course started out by passing back up the way we'd walked down in the morning. I found that between tram tracks was a relatively flat area, so I tried to stick in that part of the street where possible.

The weather was perfect, and though crowded, the running wasn't uncomfortably packed.  I felt great, and settled into something that felt good. I was acutely aware that I should probably have been running slower, since I was about 50 seconds faster than I had been for most of my runs, but it felt so good! It was sunny and I was in Europe, finally doing my marathon, running through a park past dogs and people with signs in so many languages! So I went with it.

We went through a beautiful park, and then after some turning, went through the tunnel underneath the Rijksmuseum, which I had been extremely excited about since I saw the course map. It was pretty cool - glass and art! There was a sculpture of a large cat in one of the windows :) Then out and I began looking for Travis and our visiting friends, who I'd been hoping to see at the 6km/9km mark.  I totally missed them (and they totally missed me) at the 6 km, but I saw them at the 9 km. In between those two were several DJs playing old songs!  At 9 km, Travis offered me my sunglasses, which I declined because while I expected sunshine, I also had been getting really frustrated with sweating on my sunglasses, so I decided to go without. Then I was off again - not expecting to see them again until the finish!

I remembered from the race map that the next notable thing was an out and back down President Kennedylaan. I was amused, since there's also a President Kennedylaan in The Hague - apparently he was popular.  This was the 13 km mark. Highlights included a woman with an American flag, which I found inspiring but when I said (quietly!!) "USA! USA!" as I ran past her, she just kind of looked at me and unenthusiastically said "oh, yeah..." which was pretty disappointing. Seriously, don't have an American flag at a race in Europe and be prepared to enthusiastically cheer Americans who identify themselves!

The next part of the route went down the Amstel River for quite a ways, and then back up the other side. This was absolutely beautiful. I was starting to feel tired (which I was a bit nervous about, since it was not even the halfway point) but there were wonderful things to look at. I saw sheep! And crew shells on the river! and a large boat with music! And these crazy people on those jetpack things where you levitate above the water, with music playing, doing tricks! That was amazing.  Also, the estates we were running past were amazing, gorgeous little (or big) brick houses, that looked like they would be magical to step inside. Occasionally the homeowners would be outside cheering for us!  One of the houses had a crazy glass-encased gym looking out over the canal and their giant inground swimming pool. Those people had better be really fit, because that gym seemed incredibly appealing.

Also, there was a large windmill. I love seeing those here!

Right as we crossed over the river (on a pretty bridge), I thought 'wow, there's been a lot of great DJing and stereos, but not a lot of live music. I could go for some horns!' and then turned the corner and could suddenly hear an amazingly peppy jazz group that had somewhere around 6 trumpets in it- what joy! That definitely put more of a spring in my step!

I went through the half around 2:12:30 - not too shabby - but I was definitely feeling tired and I knew that this was because I'd started out pretty zippy. Right as I passed through the half gate I tucked in behind a pretty tall guy and his friend who were running next to each other, and just stared at this guy's back and let myself go into autopilot for a few miles. This was a very effective strategy. Eventually I heard one of them say something to the other about pizza and I piped up "I could go for some pizza!" They looked back at me and I shrugged and said "oh, by the way I've been following you guys for a few miles" and we started to chat. They'd come over from London, one was Irish and the other lived in London. It was their first marathon and we talked about training, our goals, how we were feeling, and pizza. After a mile and a half or so we passed under a bridge and they had a big gang of friends and family there to cheer, so I kept going while they slowed way down to chat and we lost contact.

As I continued I realized that I was feeling pretty tired and definitely missing having comraderie. I loved the international nature of this race- there were runners from all sorts of nationalities, (based on the huge range of names on bibs), and people cheering in lots of languages. Few of those people were cheering in English, however, so it wasn't quite as much of a boost as it might otherwise have been for me. I tend to assume I can make 'race friends' by making sarcastic or funny comments and seeing who reacts, but with so few people talking around me in English, that seemed like a non-starter. So I felt even more alone than I might otherwise have, running a race by myself.

However, the course continued and so did I!  After the out-and-back of the river, the next few miles were pretty uninspiring and dragged on. I was excited to hit mile 18, but then lost track and was bummed when the next watch-beep was only mile 19. Marathon math is hard!  I've done enough races, though, that I knew to just keep chugging along and the miles would pass!  Mile 20 felt like a big accomplishment - ironically, because the race was measured in kilometers, no one around me seemed to notice we'd just hit that landmark!!

The course got more interesting - old buildings, more twists and turns, pretty streets, and way more crowd support - in the remaining miles. I was hurting and really focused on getting to the 23.1 point- the first of the two 5ks that follow mile 20.  At 23.1 I stopped and walked for a little bit, then mustered my strength and tried again. There were a lot of people walking off and on at that point, possibly because of the heat and possibly just because we'd all been running for at least 4 hours and were tired!  Then I tried to get back into that last 5k, but after struggling through 2 of them I realized my quads really, really hurt, and I was having a terrible time imagining running for another 3 kilometers.

I took stock of my situation and realized that 1) I had no time goal, 2) I had no idea how long I'd been running anyway, 3) my head was threatening a headache, and 4) no one but me cared what I did. So I gave myself permission to walk.  I put a big smile on my face, took big-fast-I'm-Will's-sister steps, and walked for about one kilometer. This was a major move on my part, giving myself permission to just walk and be okay with it, but I'm glad I did it. I was young and alive, walking down a path in a park in Amsterdam, almost done with a marathon, on a gorgeous sunny day - how glorious!

However, I was also a tired girl who wanted to be done running a marathon, so I forced myself to start up again. I ran past some people in giant pink rabbit costumes that said Duracell, which thoroughly confused me because I could've sworn that Energizer was the one with the bunny. I walked a teeny bit more and then committed. The last kilometer was triumphant. I saw Travis and our friends and for the first time in hours heard people cheering for ME SPECIFICALLY - such an encouragement!  And then the next bend, with the 500 meters to go sign in view, the stand I was running past began playing one of my all-time-favorite pump up songs - Shakira's Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) , which was the World Cup theme song from 2010 and never fails to get me jazzed. I started singing out loud as I picked up my pace and entered the OLYMPIC STADIUM.

We came in the the same way I'd entered with the cheering pack at the beginning of the day. Now, the stands were a lot more full of people cheering for us. The route took us about halfway around the track, with 'meters to go' signs every 25 meters. It seemed like there was nothing to do but run hard - what else can you do as you round the bend of an Olympic track? - and I felt amazing as I ran down the straightaway and finished my marathon.

My final time was 4:37:43. Not my fastest, but not far off from what I expected to hit (I was thinking I'd be around 4:30). My splits show I was pretty steady through the 30km mark (18 miles or so) , and then slowed way down - this definitely syncs up with my recollection!!

I'm a bit of a crier at finish lines (I'm a sucker for finish-line YouTube videos) and almost started bawling, but didn't feel like dehydrating myself too much, so I held it together. I was thrilled to get my medal, and so so proud.  Because our pre-arranged meeting spot was back out by the 500 m to go mark, I didn't stop moving after getting my medal - just headed back out, getting funneled through a line to get a banana and a bottle of Gatorade - then walked back up the route, cheering for people charging into the stadium as I had just been.

I got to the right location - but on the wrong side of the road! I could see Travis and our friends on the other side of the road, but between us were two sets of metal barricades and a whole bunch of marathoners.  I started yelling their names - a woman next to me noticed and we laughed together at how entirely unobservant they all were!  After about six tries, they heard me, and we walked together back up along the course on opposite sides. Finally we reached a crossing point, and they came over! Reunited!!

I was happy to be fêted, to chug a lukewarm yogurt packet, and to hand my water bottle off to a more lucid person! Then I took my shoes off and walked in my sock feet all the way back to our AirBnB. Being an adult is fun sometimes! Shower, clean clothes, medal back around my neck, and we wandered back out onto the streets of Amsterdam to find food. We found a great Australian-style pub, where the beer was perfection and the eggs and chorizo weren't bad either!  Then we took the tram into the center part of the city, where we wandered around. The rough plan had been to follow a Lonely Planet walk that went from a cheese store through some old churches and then ended as a jenever distillery. The churches were closed, but we found a different cheese store, got lost, got found, found a castle and the original Dam, got lost again, then found a canal and the distillery! I had a wonderful little glass of a raspberry port wine.  

Tram home, with a stop at an Indonesian takeaway spot for more protein in the form of chicken satay and rice!  We played a round of Hanabi, and then I tumbled into bed air mattress, feeling wholly satisfied with my day!

Race notes:
I was prepared to finish a marathon, but not much else. Next time, I need to do a training plan with some actual workouts built in, and more than one 20-miler. Also, I probably won't do another marathon until I have some friends to run with again!

I was very consistent with my salt (every 4 miles) and my Gu (every 5 miles), which I was pleased with. The salt was definitely necessary because of the heat. The Gu was good, and around mile 18 I ate my pecan bar which I was also happy to have.  At each water stop, I refilled my bottle with water, and grabbed a wet soaked sponge to squeeze over my head and mop off my face. All in all for fuel and heat mitigation, it was a winning strategy.

The Amsterdam Marathon was very well organized- great expo, great price, great race shirt, great medal, great logistics. Totally happy with it. Most of the course was really good, beautiful and distracting. Very few portapotties (and men peeing basically everywhere they could along the course, possibly these things are related?).

Celebration Marathon 2014 Race Report

The triumph that wasn't...

This was a really hard race for me.  It was really hard to run, and it is still really hard to think about.

After the Koln marathon I took a few weeks easy and then began training for the Celebration Marathon, January 26 in Celebration, FL.  This had been on my calendar since July, and it was my target race.  I tried to think of the training leading up to Koln as one training cycle, and the second cycle was going through the Pfitzinger 12/55 training plan leading up to Celebration.  I did the Pfitz plan as though I were aiming for a 3:40 full, although I told myself I'd be happy if I came in under 3:50. 
I did a lot of the Pfitz runs, especially in the first half of the plan, with my HRM on so I could make sure I was doing easy days easy and hard days hard.  I did notice that there were very few long runs at race pace, which made me uneasy.

A major gap in my training is that I didn't run 55 miles during that 55-mile week.  That week fell over Christmas/New Years, and I was in New York, with my family, with ice and a warm fire in the fireplace, and while I got my long runs in and a few of the others, I failed to get myself out for all of the long runs.  That might've been to the detriment of my race overall, but I was still glowing from the 15-miler at 8:12 pace I'd pulled off in December and thought I could get away with it.  Maybe I could have- I think my problems on race day went deeper than just a few skimped weeks of training.

In late November I raced the Space Coast half (new PR! 1:44:05!) and by the end of it was having trouble feeling my right foot.  I found a fantastic LMT at the finish who I started seeing regularly, and that definitely helped me get through the rest of the training and feel muscularly balanced symmetric.

I had a solid taper going into the Celebration race, which I hadn't gotten before Austin, and all in all, I thought I was in really great shape going into the marathon.  I got great sleep two nights before (terrible sleep the night before, unfortunately), I had a home-cooked dinner, and Travis and I spent the night in Celebration so when I woke up race morning I had everything laid out and I was only a mile from the starting line.

My A goal going in was 3:40. My B goal was 3:45 and my C goal was "sub 3:50". I suppose if pressed I would've said my D goal was "beat my previous time (3:58)" but I didn't really think I'd end up near it.

Travis drove me (and two random ladies who also blanched at the sight of the line for the shuttle bus) to the starting line, and I got ready for my morning.  I had my fuel belt with Endurolytes in it, I had Gu's pinned to the belt and in my pocket, I had his iPod shuffle loaded with Wait Wait Don't Tell Me! episodes I'd "saved up", and a bottle of water to sip before I started.  For the first time before a marathon I did a legit warm up- 4 minutes of easy running, then some time stretching, then another 4-5 minutes of running ending near race pace.  I noticed during the warm-up that my right Achilles was hurting, which made me a little nervous.

I found the 3:40 pacer in the start corral and did the "right thing"- asked him what his race plan was.  He said he'd run between 8:22-8:24 miles the whole time, very steady, slow a little at water stops.  That sounded good.  My plan was to tuck in with the pace group for the first half and, as my Pfitz book said, try to not to think or work any more than necessary.

After the second mile, I checked my watch and saw that we were running about an 8:00 pace.  I looked around for a while and then spoke up, and he said "oh, is that too fast? I'll slow down".  I was trying really hard to just let him think and just relax, but I never really felt relaxed.  I checked my splits every time we crossed a mile marker and we were consistently 30, then closer to 60 seconds ahead. Looking back, I should have left the pace group and run at my race pace.  I never really relaxed or settled in, I felt like I was working too hard, and my Garmin after the fact shows that the slowest mile in my first half was 8:19. Mile 2 was sub-8:00.  So lesson learned the hard way- I'm not going to trust pacers even if they tell me their plan.  I'm going to run my race, and my planned pace, and if it happens to match theirs then I'll stick with them.

I waved to Travis in front of our hotel around mile 4.  I tried to take my first Gu then too, and my oh-so-clever safety pin plan backfired in a mighty way- I tore open a Gu, but couldn't extract if from where I'd tucked it, so it leaked all over me and I ended up licking Gu off my fingers and then having to wash off at the next water stop.  That didn't faze me as much as it could have, because I knew I had other Gu in my pocket and would just take those rather than trying to deal with the weird sticky booby trap I'd laid for myself.

Part of the course was on a series of wooden boardwalks.  These were beautiful and would've been fun to run through in a smaller crowd- in a tight pack, especially when trying to stick with the pacer, it was incredibly stressful and I dreaded it every time we got on one.

So I crossed the timing mat for the half around 1:49 on my watch.  The half times weren't reported in the results so I'm not positive, but I know it was closer to 1:49, maybe even 1:48. I think I was a little bit ahead of the pacer at that point because I didn't stop at a lot of the early water stops.  I want to say "and then my wheels came off", except I never felt like my wheels were on.  I'd been pushing the pace that whole time-more than I'd planned, because I hadn't been looking too hard at my watch, and I felt like there was no way I could hang on.  I stopped and walked a little bit then, and watched the pace group disappear.  I knew Travis was going to be around mile 17, because the course was a double loop and he'd said he'd be in the same spot.  At that point, my whole goal was "just get to Travis".  I felt awful, and I hated the fact that I felt like that at that stage in the race.  My Achilles was hurting with every step, the pace group was gone, and I knew I'd used up way more than I should have in the first half, which was made worse by the fact that my "plan" had been to settle in and not try hard in the first half.

I made it to Travis. Like we'd planned, he was at the ready with a Clif bar, some Gus, and asked "Do you want me to take your fuel belt?".  Like we had not planned, I desparately replied "I need you to walk with me!!!!!" and after a second of staring at me he said "Okay! Let me get my backpack!" so I ran on while he shoved stuff back into his bag and caught up with me, at which point I started walking again and telling him how awful I felt, how much my Achilles hurt, and how I wasn't having any fun. I made him tell me several times that my time didn't matter, I should just keep going.  I did eat some of the Clif Bar he had (I learned something from my long runs!) and relieved him of the other Gu's so I could continue avoiding my sticky trap.  The 3:45 pace group ran past us and I said "I'm going to try to catch them." and took off again.

I managed to slowly catch back up to the 3:45 group, but couldn't hang with them for long.  At mile 18, I think, I stopped to walk and I lost them for good. At Mile 20, I remember looking at my watch and thinking "If I can do the next 6.2 in an hour, I'll be able to run a ......." but I can't remember now what the time was, or what I thought I could do. At that point I was trying to run 10:00 miles, and taking a walk break at almost every mile marker.

The course was very empty by then.  I went back-and-forth with "tall bearded guy with a red shirt" for a while and he was usually the only person I could see. The boardwalks were lonely instead of crowded, but still not fun because by then, nothing seemed fun.  At one point I was ahead of my red-shirted friend and caught up with another guy who started, and then said "Wow, you're the first person I've seen in a really long time!!"

It was very frustrating to be passed by people, because I had wanted so badly to run a strong race and pass them instead.  I tried to stay on top of things that I'd neglected during the Austin race, so I took 2 Gu's between miles 20 and 26.2.  Unfortunately, my calves started cramping very badly during that stretch, and a lot of the times I stopped to walk because I would take a step and they would be so tight that I thought they were going to explode (I'm not sure biologically if that's possible, but it sure felt like that was going happen).  In retrospect, this was a clear sign of dehydration, but I didn't know that. I just thought they were flaking out on me.  My quads still felt ready to go, and I distinctly felt that I had power left for speed, but I didn't trust my calves to propel me.

So I struggled through the rest of the race.  The 3:55 pacer caught up to me, and I fought really hard to stay ahead of her.  She passed me, and I caught back up.  She was really encouraging, as I look back, and spoke to me a few times to keep me going.  I remember wanting to explain to her why 3:55 wasn't an accomplishment, it was pathetic considering what I'd set out to do, but I'm glad I didn't because I don't think it would've been coherent or helpful. It's how I felt, though. At that point it was just "I should at least finish under 3:55".

So, I did my best.  I tried to run the last 1.2 miles but I needed another walk break partway through, then I told my calves they'd better function and ran as hard as I thought seemed prudent until the finish line.

I stopped my watch at 3:54:22, which was also my official time for the race.  I stumbled forward to a volunteer who gave me a medal, and then, in what I felt was my biggest accomplishment of the day, I did not vomit on her.  I pushed her aside and vomited where she had been standing.  Someone noticed the pale, heaving form of Nan and then I had two volunteers seating me in a chair, then telling me to get up and lying me down on the ground. Travis appeared from the crowd and as I lay there with my feet elevated and my head down, EMTs showed up to very eagerly take my blood pressure.  They stood me back up again, then sat me back down again (I am not sure why) and told me my blood pressure was really, really low, and I was dehydrated. 

Ohhhh.. so THAT's what was so hard about that race!

The eager EMTs proceeded to give me an oxygen mask, while telling me to drink Gatorade.  I tried to explain that I couldn't drink while wearing an oxygen mask.  Then someone else pointed out to one of them that the oxygen mask needed to be plugged into an oxygen tank for it to do anything.  They kept telling me to drink and I stared at my bottle of Gatorade, wishing I could, but enjoying the cold oxygen.

Eventually they took the mask away and I got down to business rehydrating.  The finish line was very disorganized and when Travis went to find me more Gatorade, all he could find was Powerade that he had to pay for. I don't know if there was Gatorade available, but if there wasn't, they should probably have thought that through better.  I sat there drinking my Ades for almost an hour, until my legs began to cramp from sitting still, and another tired runner came tumbling across the finish line and needed my chair.

Travis stood me up and we made it about 30 feet before my quads started cramping (that is very painful. I had no idea.) and I found another chair.  He went to try to find me food- in the disorganized finish area, it was really hard to figure out where the food was, and ended up with two small rolls and two egg rolls, which were delicious but not very substantial. We debated options and decided trying to get out of there was out best move, so we slowly made our way to wait for an agonizingly long time for the shuttle back to the hotel.  That gave me time to process how awful my race had been and how disappointed I was, and to cry enough to dehydrate myself pretty well again. Oy.

After a long wait, and a long drive (with more Gatorade!), and a long line, it was 2:00 and I had a Chipotle burrito bowl to shovel into my mouth for the rest of the trip home.

So, that was my untriumphant race.  I learned a lot about personal race strategy- reading in my training books doesn't translate directly to how I feel in the moment, doing the racing, and I felt like I learned some more cues and ways to strategize for myself and my race.  I definitely need to calibrate my hydration better, and look into more concentrated sodium/potassium options.  I need to be more conservative at the beginning of a race- "go big or go home" didn't really pan out for me, and if I'd started at a 3:50 pace and picked it up partway through I think it would've been a different story.  I keep telling myself it was only my 3rd marathon, though, and eventually I'll figure out how to get myself from start to finish in a happy, speedy way.

The course and race were decent, but not stellar.  I think it would've been a really fun half, but as a full, running a double loop in a planned community felt like running past the same 4 houses for 4 hours.  Not particularly exciting, and nothing to distract from the pain.  I wish there had been a clear map of the finish area available so we knew where the food was.  Also, Travis is amazing and very good at taking care of me.

I will get that 3:50. I think of the 3 plans I've done, the FIRST plan with 3 days of running + cross-training was the least stressful, plus it had more long runs closer to race pace, which made me feel more confident. I'll probably try that for my next run, but for now I'm taking a break from marathon training because I've been doing it almost non-stop for 14 months.

RheinEnergie Marathon Köln - Cologne Marathon 2013: Race Report

I flew to Germany on October 10th (and landed the 11th), and was met at the airport by my wonderful running partner, Cece, and her adorable children. On the 12th we caravaned with other local runners from her village of Zemmer to the city of Cologne.  Saturday the 12th was long and more stressful than any of us would have liked, I think.  Traffic was heavy and it was a challenge to find the race expo, because roads were already being closed down in anticipation of the race.  When we found the expo it was less overwhelming than I'd feared. We actually didn't have to wait in line at all to get our race bags, which included fun snacks, small boxes of pasta, commemorative beer glasses, and lots of literature that was unfortunately in German so I have no idea what it said.  When we eventually made it to our hotel it was a relief. A friend of Cece's had prepared dinner which we reheated in our suite- a brilliant plan, because it gave us the carbs we needed plus the confidence that we weren't going to eat some restaurant-food-gone-bad and cause disaster on the race course.

October 13, 2013: Race day!
The race was at 11:30 AM- because I trained in Florida in the summer I hadn't done any practice runs at that time, and as a result I don't think I ate enough in the morning. I had my typical long-run breakfast but it was hours before the run actually began, and by the time we were done running I joked that we'd basically had "Gu and a marathon for lunch".  We passed the nervous hours playing with Cece's boys and going to cheer for the half-marathoners whose course ran near our hotel.

I went back and forth a lot about my race outfit- it was not raining but it was grey and overcast, with temperatures hovering around 50 degrees. At the last minute I swapped a tanktop + long-sleeve layer for a t-shirt + long-sleeve layer, plus shorts and compression sleeves. This was an agonizing decision to make but in the end it was the right one, for which I was grateful!!

We left the hotel around 10:50 and walked about a kilometer to the starting line. The start was very, very crowded, and it took long minutes of walkwaddleshuffling to make it to the staging area that matched our bibs.  Red and Orange groups went before us, and we found space in the back of the corral between the Yellow and Green groups to hang out, stretch, and bounce nervously to German techno music.  I cued up my Garmin and my GPS-camera, and the announcer counted down (in German!) to start the race!!  We crossed the starting line about 8 minutes after the race began.

My job was to wear the Garmin and keep Cece on pace. Our goal was to enjoy the race, to smile throughout, and to finish happy.  The plan was to run just under 11:00 miles for the first few miles of the race, but as we settled into a pace Cece was running closer to 10:40 and felt good there, so we just settled in there. In the beginning the biggest challenge was to run our race, and not pick up speed when people went past us.  We saw her boys and their babysitter right around mile 1- a great boost- and Cece grabbed her iPod and I dropped off my long-sleeve shirt, committing to run the rest of the race in short sleeves.

The first 10 miles were very peaceful, easy to run and we had to focus to rein ourselves in and stay right around that 10:30 mark.  We had our first Gus while running at Mile 5, and then second Gu and a brief walk break at Mile 10.  After that we kept on going, but I think it got a lot harder to stay on track and the miles seemed a lot longer.  We made race-friends with a German girl from Dusseldorf, who had heard us talking about how we felt good and wanting to keep feeling good and having fun and said that was her plan too :-)

We saw two of Cece's friends who were ahead of us during points when the course doubled back on itself, which was very fun.  As we approached the halfway mark, we also saw what I believe were the first two women of the race- since we crossed the halfway mark around 2:16 and the fastest woman finished in 2:28, they were literally running twice as fast as we were!!! At the halfway mark I looked at CeCe and said "Okay, ready to do it again?" and we tried to shake off the last 13.1 miles. She said "It's all downhill from here!" and we continued on.

I had an extremely enjoyable time running.  We stuck together, sometimes with me slightly ahead as a "rabbit", especially in a few patches where we fell off pace and I wanted to try to encourage her to stay on it instead of letting herself slow down and stay at a slower pace.  Cece was right on pace up until around Mile 16, where she hit a wall and was fighting very hard to keep going.  We took a walk break with our Gu there and it was hard to start running again.  The girl's a rock star, though- every time I told her "if you pick it up now, you can get to where you want" she pulled back in and clawed back to the pace she wanted to be running.
We knew that from 30-35 km there was a steady drop in the course, and from 35-40 was a net uphill.  When we hit 30 I encouraged her to kick it up but I think at that point "kick" was a mythical beast. I also realized that what looked like a nice downhill stretch on the elevation map wasn't actually a noticeable drop, so our dreams of running a killer 5k at that point were more about moving forward.  By that point my hip flexors were protesting with every step I took, and while I knew I'd be able to finish I was also fantasizing about sitting down.

In the 30-35 km stretch we also picked up one of Cece's friends, who had pulled a muscle earlier in the race and was more interested in having company than running hard.  It was fun to add to our little group.  One thing I really appreciated about my race experience was that I did not feel lonely at all- because I had a friend right there with me!  Someone to point out cute dogs too, or marvel at beautiful architecture, or just grimace at- it made a huge difference in the hours of running.

Once we'd picked up our 3rd member, I stopped worrying about pacing at all and focused on encouraging them both to keep moving. When we stopped for our last Gu I could looked at Cece and said "I know you don't feel like it but I'm telling you, you still have a run in you. So just trust me and try to find it!" and she did!  Once we got into the last 5k of the race there was a definite sense of relief, and the crowd support picked up dramatically.  I think it made the last painful miles better. It was also really encouraging to see how our pacing strategy had worked out quite nicely.  The last 2 miles were right back on pace, and we were steadily passing people for that whole stretch.  A lot of those people were super-fit men with Red bib numbers; Tortoise and the Hare, anyone?

With about a mile and a half to go we came around a corner to a band playing the opening riff to "Sweet Home Alabama".  It was fantastic. I was thrilled to finally hear a song I knew the words too- there were lots of drumming groups and individuals blasting music along the route, but most of the music was German techno/pop and while the beats were nice, I had no idea what the songs were (on a related note, I also couldn't read any of the encouraging signs people were holding for their family members, which was very odd and sort of disappointing. I like to be distracted and have things to ponder as I ran so I tried to guess what they said, but mostly came up with nonsensical sentences based on cognates that don't actually exist).

Anyway- with "Sweet Home Alabama" ringing in my ears, I also noticed that the course was very familiar because we were in the stretch where we'd seen the leaders, hours before.  The end was coming!  I let Cece and her friend know when we had 1 mile remaining- that's a huge relief after running 25 of them. 1 mile is so manageable!  I watched the tenths tick by and when we had just 0.2 left to go, according to my Garmin, I excitedly announced it and watched Cece kick it into an awesomely high gear. She passed people like crazy and I tried to lead her around silly slow walkers as best I could.  Unfortunately, I think all the twists and turns through narrow streets tricked my Garmin, and so what I thought was only 0.2 miles left to go was actually 0.5 miles left to go!  Every time we went around a corner I strained to see a finish line, and was repeatedly dismayed when I saw nothing. The Germans like to put big inflatable archways over the routes, so there were a bunch of those with different companies' logos (BMW, K2 skates, etc.) which looked like finish lines but weren't actually the end.  Finally, though, we saw the actual end in sight, and charged across it.  An announcer said our names in an excited German sentence, and we kind of all collapsed into a sweaty exhausted hug. Our final time was 4:41:33, and my Garmin said the last 0.47 miles we were running sub-9:00. A seriously fantastic kick for some tired ladies!

We took some happy pictures, and then got our medals. I was pleased not to be crying hysterically like I had been at the end of my first marathon. I was tired, and I was ready to stop running, but I could also tell that all my hard training over the summer had paid off. My goal had been to train hard enough that I could pace Cece through her race and have energy left over for encouraging and doing the thinking when she was exhausted, and I think I accomplished it. I kept track of splits, threw out the trash, and felt decent at the end despite having run a marathon.  That was exactly what I'd wanted, and I'm nothing but pleased with it!!

Post-race, I had some yummy donuts and fresh breads, a bite of rather disgusting summer sausage (don't know why I tried that, since I know I don't like summer sausage), and a few sips of "alkoholfrei" beer which I discarded as soon as I found the regular, alkohol-full beer.  We found the rest of our group, and then made our way back through a maze of streets to the hotel.  This allowed us to walk right past the Cologne Cathedral, which we'd somehow completely missed as we ran past it. I got some fun pictures in front of it.

Then back to the hotel for a shower and then I went out with the babysitter for a German dinner and more beer, which I was really looking forward to. Cece curled up with her boys and I think that was all she needed to relax.  I had a yummy dish of noodles with chicken, pork, and roasted tomatoes, and another good local beer.  Then we loaded up the car and drove back to Zemmer, where everyone slept like a rock in their own beds.

Gear:
I ran the race in compression sleeves.  I'm not totally sure I'd do that again; my calves were sort of twinging after 20 miles or so.  I might try compression socks for a few long runs and see how that goes. I love compression sleeves post-long run but I didn't like the way my muscles felt towards the end (although I'm not certain that was because of the sleeves).

The Route:
The beginning of the course followed the Rhine River. After we left the river we made lots of little out-and-backs and lollipops through different parts of the city. I really feel like I got a good sense of what Cologne is like, and felt very strongly that I was running through Europe.  The buildings and signs were exactly what I would have expected. We passed a lot of beautiful churches, and some open park-like areas.  We paralleled train tracks in a few different locations, but never had to cross any.  The race finished back in the center of the city, including the last curves going past the Cologne Cathedral (the Dom).  It was beautiful. Elevation change was barely noticeable throughout. We'd studied the elevation profile but even in places where we expected uphill and downhill segments, it wasn't much and didn't have too much impact on our pace except for one uphill climb near the end of the route.  I tried to take a picture at least every mile, so I have the race wonderfully documented.

The weather:
It was close to perfect. The sun peeked out a few times but mostly it was grey and overcast. There were a few times where the wind gusted rather unpleasantly, but there were enough twists and turns in the route that we were never running into the wind for too long.  As soon as I stopped running I was FREEZING and it took me a long time to warm up even after we were back in the hotel, but I'd rather have been comfortable running and cold afterwards than uncomfortable while running!

Now I know for next time:

My awesome GPS camera really does suck the battery as the GPS is on, but also takes wonderful pictures and was great to have on me.

Last-minute outfit changes sometimes end really well.  Running a marathon in running shorts, even if it's "chilly" out, is very comfortable, but those shorts plus my Camelbak pack ride up awkwardly after a while.

Pre-emptive Gu at the end of a marathon is a great plan.

When the route is terribly sticky from electrolytes being spilled, a brief foot-shuffle in the grass on the roadside solves the problem, although it also gets me strange looks from bystanders.

The Runner's World Run Less-Run Faster plan was a great training plan, especially because biking as cross-training was great during the sticky-awful-hot summer.

Running a marathon at a pace slower than what I've trained for is really fun; without the mental push and my muscles at their limit, I had a huge smile on my face and time to take it all in.

Special thanks to Cece for letting me be a part of her wonderful day.

Livestrong Austin Marathon 2013: Race Report

*Note: I'm not about to start blogging regularly- but I thought I should write this up, for friends/family/random strangers who are googling race reports.*

*Note 2: This is ridiculously long and detailed.

February 17, 2013: Race day!  My prep for this marathon was relatively strict adherence to the Hanson's Marathon Method training plan, with a few nearly-fatal flaws, namely, that there are no hills in FL where I trained, and that I pulled a calf muscle 3.5 weeks before the race and had to sit out 2+ weeks of training as a result.

My training runs were aiming for an 8:15-8:20 race pace.  My initial goal was a 3:45 marathon, figuring that the hills would slow me down some.  After the calf debacle, however, I got to the starting line covered with bright blue Kinesiology Tape and figuring that finishing at all would be an amazing blessing. So I ended up with an A goal of 3:45, a B goal of 4:00, and a C goal of "finishing the full instead of the half".

I got to the very crowded start line about 5 minutes before the race began, and managed to get into the 3:50 starting area.  I never saw the 3:50 pace group, or the 3:45 pace group for that matter.

The first mile was stupidly crowded.  I had anticipated this and was carrying water so I could skip the first few water stops, but wasn't anticipating having people WALKING in front of me (if you are planning on walking within the first 1/2 mile of a race, please don't start in front of me. Or in front of anyone else) and  strollers (I hope they got asked to leave!).  Other than those hurdles, however, the crowd moved pretty well, and after the first 2 miles everyone seemed pretty settled.

I saw my amazing cheerleaders around mile 3, where they whooped and hollered and clapped and then, I was gone!  The first 5-6 miles were very hilly.  I maintained a pretty good pace.  I had kept it closer to 9:00 for the first 5k and then tried to settle into something closer to 8:40.  However, after an almost fully down-hill mile I realized that my quads were definitely going to be the limiting factor for the race.

At mile 8 I stopped and passed my long-sleeve layer to my amazing cheerleaders (I think Nora hopped up and down every time she saw me), and also ditched my heart rate monitor strap, again, because I knew my heart rate was not going to be my limiting factor.

Probably my favorite moment of the race was the turn after the second bridge as we ran through Downtown Austin- there was a slight uphill, the crowds were 3-4 deep and SCREAMING, and I couldn't stop grinning.  That crowd support was immediately followed by the "Livestrong Mile", another uphill, high-energy dose of encouragement.  The next bit of the course was a climb up what I think was a highway ramp, and then down and under an over-pass.  I was so taken in by the course that I totally missed the 10 mile mark (I was planning on having Gu every 5 miles) and ended up taking my second one somewhere between 10 and 11 when I realized where I was on the course.  A few more miles, and then, the split!

The half-marathoners went right and the rest of us went left- I stared at the immense crowd of people going right, said a prayer that I'd be able to get through the second half of the race, and turned left.  Immediately the course felt very lonely.  A very small proportion of the runners were full marathoners, as it turned out.  There were still people periodically cheering, and some very well-staffed water stops, but the ambient energy level dropped and the race became a very solitary endeavor.  At the 13.1 mark my time was 1:55- still very successfully keeping my pace under 9:00 for every mile- but I was beginning to feel my quads in a rather unhappy way.

The next few miles were much the same, and by mile 16 I was DRAGGING.  My splits show that I didn't slow down much, but maintaining a sub-9:00 pace felt extremely difficult.  This was when I realized that the Hanson's plan was probably not my best choice for my first marathon.  The longest run in there was 16 miles, and the last time I ran over 20 miles was 2009.  So instead of feeling mentally ready for the rest of the race, all I could do was picture the Hancock Canal Run and think "I have to start THAT? right NOW?"

I pulled out my trusty companion, my iPod, and fired up one of my favorite pump-up songs: The Fighter- which I listened to twice through in mile 18, which in my mind become my "Jon Orozco mile". 
Give em hell, turn their heads
Gonna live life 'til we're dead.
Give me scars, give me pain
Then they'll say to me, say to me, say to me
There goes the fighter, there goes the fighter
Here comes the fighter
That's what they'll say to me, say to me, say to me,
This one's a fighter
- Gym Class Heroes, "The Fighter"

All songs come to an end, however, and I was still only at mile 19, and dragging.  I don't think I hit the wall, so much as that I hit a point where my quads were shredded and yet I wasn't letting them rest. I was, however, incredibly grateful for every step I took, because I truly believe God answered the many prayers to hold my calf together for that race.  All of the leg pain was in my ill-prepared quads, never my calves!  Somewhere in there I tore off the pace bracelets I was wearing- math seemed too hard, and just finishing sounded like a more reasonable goal.

~~Special thanks here to the woman who was sitting in her driveway when the nozzle on one of my Fuel Belt bottles broke.  I was beyond thinking about small motor skills, but she very helpfully unscrewed a good lid from an empty bottle and replaced the broken lid from my full bottle. Thanks, random stranger!~~

The miles continued... Somewhere around mile 20 I also started feeling like the act of navigating a water stop was too difficult to undertake, and gradual dehydration in the last few miles certainly didn't help. I did some math and realized that if I ran 6 10:00 miles I could finish under 4 hours (although I was aware I had to do slightly better than 10:00 because of that darn 0.2 at the end). Two girls had hopped onto the course to pace a friend and I tucked in with them and ran 2 miles closer to 9:00.  They were great support, cheering me on, helping me get my last Gu packet out of my awkward zippered pocket, and helping me up the last hill.  I slowed down enough to lose them, however, and then it was just me in my head.  The last 6 miles are a net downhill, but at this point my quads were no happier about that than the uphills, and my splits do not reflect a happy downhill ride in to the finish line!

Right around mile 22 the 3:55 pace group overtook me.  This was the first pace group I'd seen, and I tried to stick with them.  Since they must have started after me I knew that meant I was on track for slightly higher than a 3:55 finish even if I did finish with them.  Around mile 24 I saw Mat and Nora, with a sign and more jumping up and down. Nora ran onto the course and asked "Do you want your last Gu?", to which I replied "No, I want a finish line", sparking some laughter around me.  Looking back, I should've taken the Gu, but at the time the thought of swallowing sugar-gel - perhaps even procuring water to go with it- sounded overly difficult.  At this point my pace was over 9:00, for sure.

Shortly thereafter a gust of wind blew my hat off, forcing me to stop, turn around, walk back, bend over, put it back on my head, and use what was my last burst of energy to try to recatch the sparkly angel wings of the 3:55 pacers.  I couldn't stick with them for long, but the amazing Leslie hopped on at that point to accompany me for the last mile and change.

I am still in awe at how much a difference it made to have her there!!  She was encouraging and entertaining, carrying my Fuel Belt and iPod for me, filling up my water bottle, and adding things about marathons to Psalms to keep my mind occupied.  We quoted verses on top of each other, prayed out loud, and she kept me going while I questioned my strength.  I know it was only the last mile, but that was a looong mile.

We passed the final water stop and I realized some sadistic route planner had decided to add one last giant hill, starting around the 800-m-to-go mark.  I came to the unhappy conclusion that I could literally walk faster than the awkward, painful run-shuffle I had been reduced to, so for the first time in the race, I stopped trying to run. Instead I did what I thought was power-walking up that hill, resulting in a series of incredibly awkward race photos reflecting expressions of pain, grit, and dismay.  Most of that walk came out of my arms, so my biceps and triceps were also incredibly sore the next day.  The "400 m to go" sign was at the top of the hill and I decided I was going to start running when I got there. 

Around that point a few things happened.  The hill ended and a downhill slope began, the route turned a corner, and a nice man very politely called Leslie off the course because the last bit was fenced off and she wasn't allowed to cross the finish line.  She went off and I turned the corner, picking up my pace and hearing her faintly call "Go, Nan, Go!" through the fenceline.

Usually I have quite a kick at the end of a race.  Not so much this time around, but I had the strength to run downhill and turn and suddenly there was the finish line in front of me!  I knew I had started when the clock said 5 minutes, and as I approached the line I saw that the time was around 4:02:XX.  That was the point when I realized that despite all the awfulness of the last few miles, I had actually done it and I was going to get in under 4 hours.  Hooray!  I can't say I was excited so much as relieved. Relieved to have done it, relieved to have accomplished what had become my goal, relieved that my calves had survived, my prayers had been answered, and then, suddenly, just relieved that I could stop running.

I ended in quite a daze.  I started kind of stumble-walking, trying to breathe deeply.  I think my body was trying to figure out how much it could shut down, and my breathing was really shallow and fast- note to self: breathing is NOT OPTIONAL.  I was trying not to cry because that seemed like a lot of work, and then I saw the people handing out the medals.

Now, I really like medals. I like decorating my house with them.  This time, though, the medal actually felt like an award I had earned, not just a bonus for running.  I had seen people walking around with their medals as I was powering up that last hill, and the thought of getting that medal made me push up the hill.  When I realized that all I had left to do was walk up to the lady and she would give me the medal I had earned, I lost it.  I walked up to her sobbing, and she said "Oh, honey!" and gave me a hug.  She asked if I was okay and I said yes, and then she put a big shiny medal around my neck. Mission accomplished. 26.2 in 3:58:09.

The rest of the day was a glorious denouement of hydration and proteination, finding my amazing cheerleaders, calling my husband who had been tracking me on the race app all morning, turning stretching into a group project, a shower, and an amazing Austin-y lunch featuring a lot of cheese and a chocolate almond torte.

The race was overall quite nice- great expo, great crowd support in the downtown area, beautiful starting set-up at the Capitol building, and awesome shirt and medal.  The hills were brutal, and definitely I should've taken them more fully into consideration than I did when training and setting goals.

Did I start too fast?  Maybe.  I couldn't have known that, though.  I was trying to trust my training, and in theory I was trained to run 8:30-or-so miles.  On a flatter course I think I could've finished closer to 3:45 or 3:50.  The pain in my quads was what eventually slowed me down.  That said, next time around I think I will be a bit more conservative at the beginning and drop my pace more gradually.


The hardest part for me was that there were so many miles when I was unhappy- not enjoying the course, not enjoying the fact that I was running, not enjoying the beautiful weather.  One of my top goals for my next marathon is to find a balance of different training and different goals (maybe a flatter course, too) so that I more fully enjoy the experience- and enjoy the pain- rather than feeling miserable and defeated.

Now I know for next time:
When drinking and taking Gu sound "too hard", they are becoming more and more important and should be done!!!

Hanson's plan made me faster, but didn't prepare me mentally for the full 26.2  I would definitely recommend it for runners who already have experience with the distance and the associated mental battle.  I'll probably revisit it in the future.

Having a pacer at the end (on a course that allows it) is awesome.

Training in the flatlands for a hilly marathon is naive insanity. 

Marathons are fun.

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Someday, this will become a repository for tales of adventures, presumably accompanied with wonderful pictures taken by Travis and a heaping portion of sass from Nan. In the meantime, send us e-mail. If you're reading this, you know how to reach us.