Austin marathon 2007

This is kinda long winded but I had a long time to think about my run while I was running slow :). And typing on my BB is helping keep my mind off of the ice bath I'm sitting in.

GPS and Heart Rate data from the Austin Marathon
I started out just a touch ahead of pace for the first 6 miles . Then I had to take a crap. So stopped at an outhouse and set a new record time for running a mile with a crap stop (7:50, old record was 7:59). When I came out, the 3:10 group was just going by. I ran with them until about mile 10 but the 15 second per mile walk breaks were putting me further and further behind. The hills didn't help either. So around that time I conceded and decided to run like it was a long training run so I wouldn't have as long of a recovery time as I did after HI. My heart rate quickly dropped to the 150s and my pace slowed way down. The 3:15 group came and went. The 3:20 group came and went. The 3:30 group came and went. Once I had been running for over an hour, my forerunner only showed minutes so I started counting for my 15 second walk breaks. My counting got slower and slower and by mile 20 I was counting half seconds. I hope the breaks will help me recover faster but they were a mixed blessing on the course. I couldn't wait to get to the mile markers to take them, but it was harder to get moving again. I think I fell victim to bob's theory about running races at lower elevation. The first few miles feel great, but you're used to having your lungs be the limiting factor so you kill your legs early. That is how I felt. I tried to speed up several times but I felt like my legs just wouldn't carry me any faster. I did end up running about a 7 min mile on the last mile in a last ditch attempt to break 3:40.

Overall, several things hurt my performance

• Recovery time from HI
• Not training enough times per week. Hal's senior training program is okay if you just want to run a marathon every month or two, but it isn't a program for getting significantly faster. I also should have not split up several of my long runs into 2 shorter runs. And I should have gone slower and finished the 20 miler. For the future I'm thinking of doing some longer runs (24-28 miles) down in Auburn or Sacramento.
• The master cleanse - Just bad timing to deplete my glycogen stores.
  
• The hills - There was about 1300 vertical feet of climbing (about 500 feet less than Honolulu).
  

I'm just finishing my ice bath and I think I'll follow it up with a little nap.