Leading up to the what was to become my 10th Chicago Marathon, I must admit, I was getting a little psyched out. All anyone was talking about was the weather. They were saying it was going to be hot. They were saying it was going to be humid. Records would fall and PRs wouldn't. I tried to stay calm early in the week. Forecasts change. I know if I was planning an outdoor party for Sunday October 7th, I would be sure that no matter what the forecasts said on Mon-Fri, there surely would be a cold front coming through on Sunday morning. That's the way my parties typically go.
But the forecats never did change. So finally, on Friday I decided that it was time to stop hoping for something that I can't control and start figuring out what I was gonna do on Sunday. I had a race to run on Sunday and nothing was gonna get me out of that. Well, that's not entirely true. I did have the option of slipping some Pitocin into Kelly's drinking water on Saturday night to send into her labor and giving myself a free pass, but something just seemed wrong about that, so I resisted the temptation. Well, that's not entirely true. The truth is, I couldn't find any Petocin at Walgreens.
So the plan was to run the first half of the race in 1:20 and then see what I had left. I figured that if I was feeling great at the midway point, I would always have the option of picking it up and if I could negative split, a PR would still be in play. More realistically, I figured that would at least ensure that I could go relatively slow in the second half of the race and still be able to run a decent time. Once I decided on the strategy, I started to feel a little bit better about the day, but I was still edgy for the few days leading up to the race. I just had a feeling it was going to painful.
So by now everyone knows how hot it was in Chicago on race day, so I won't belabor that point too much. It was hot and I had a nice sweat going in the starting corral before the gun even went off. I met up with my friend Dave in the corral and we went over our final race strategies and basically tried to convince ourselves that the weather wasn't sooo bad. Finally the gun went off and within 23 seconds I was off and running.
I'm always surprised at just how many people I pass in that first mile of any large race. For the most part, self-seeding works pretty good, but there are always the people who just want to get way up front. In a 5K I could understand the thinking, but in a marathon, it just doesn't make sense. Especially in a marathon like today, where everyone knows they need to run slower than they are truly capable of. But it happens every year and it happened again. A 1:20 half would have me coming through each mile in about 6:07, so of course I came through that first mile at 6:00 flat and was feeling great.
I've never been one to write my strategy in pen. I like to be flexible on race day to allow for whatever might come up so I can adjust to how I feel. When can I say. It's a gift. Do you believe that? Yeah, me neither. When it comes to pacing, I have the discipline of a 3 year old (not my 3 year old. He's perfectly disciplined. cough cough). So when I came through that first mile feeling so good, I completely dropped the 1:20 nonsense, and just decided to run. I felt absolutely great. I was running solid 6 minute miles and was hardly even breathing. I was a machine. I couldn't be stopped.
I saw my aunts on the course and high-fived them. I saw my wife and joked with her that she can't go into labor for a few more hours because I was on fire. Heat? Humidity? I mock you. I kept thinking just get to Addison (the northern most point of course) and then once you turn around, you'll have a nice breeze in your face and things will be cooler. And it seemed to work too. I was cool. I was drinking. I was strategizing. I was doing it.
Through the downtown and the through the halfway point at 1:18:32. Still feeling great. I came up on mile 14, and saw some friends working the water stop and veered to the other side of the street just to get water from them, because I could. I could do anything. I was still feeling great. But it was getting hot. And sunny. Oh that sun. I saw my wife again somewhere around mile 15 and she asked if I was feeling good. I said…"We'll see." We'll see? What happened? Where was that unshakable confidence? I'm melting.
But I can get it back. A gel around mile 17 and my first dousing of water. Up to this point, I was trying to keep as much water off of me as possible. But now, desperate times call for desperate measures. And suddenly I was desperate. I poured water down my back and in my face. It felt great. I felt rejuvenated. I passed the woman runner that I was trading spots with for the past few miles. But this stupid fool on his bike with course marshal jacket, who is stalking the woman runner is driving me crazy. Why do I feel like I'm racing this bike? Get away from me bike. I hate this bike. I want to tackle this bike. What do I need to do to get rid of this bike!!! Then the woman and her bike were gone. And so were my 6 minute miles.
It was at mile 18 that I realized this wasn't going to be a PR day. It was going to be a survival day. It was tough to keep going as I saw my pace slip further and further from 6 flat and closer and closer to 7. I broke the race down and just started taking it in 2 mile chunks. Get to 20. Get to 22. Get to 24. Get to the finish. It helped me. But something else was helping me. Something was different about this race. Even though I was fading bad, I was also passing people. It's not often that you can drop 40 seconds from your pace and still pass people this late in a race, but it was happening. It kept me going. I started to race for place instead of for time. It kept a challenge out there. It gave me something to focus on.
But something else was different too. People were cheering for me. I mean not just cheering like they do in every marathon. People were looking me in the eye and talking to me. They were cheering for ME. At first I thought well, I do have a pretty good tan this year and I am in Pilsen. I can play that role. Viva La Mexico! But then it happened in Chinatown too. That's a stretch. And down the final stretch on Michigan. Hmmm. I finally came to realize, that I was pretty much running by myself. There was 1 or 2 people about 100 yards in front of me, and no one close behind me. People came out to cheer and if I was the only thing they had to cheer for, so be it. It was strange, but great.
I saw my wife one final time around mile 23 and she asked how I was feeling. I though the answer was pretty obvious based on how I felt, but I still was able to mutter something along the lines of, "I'll finish." And I finally did in 2:44:02, good for 76th place, about 5 and 1/2 minutes slower than last year, but almost 175 places higher.
While I'm happy with the effort, I must say that there is still a sense of incompleteness to this marathon season. The one thing I love about the Chicago marathon is that for the past 9 years, it always allowed me to go out and race the marathon and see where I stood for the year. It gave me tangible proof that this year was a success. There was no "if I taper" or "if it wasn't so hilly" or "if I had better weather." It was a time that I could compare to last year's race and compare apples to apples. There's definitely no comparing this race to anything. It was definitely, hmmm, unique. I feel like this year was a PR effort, just not PR results.
Today, I feel like I was hit by a cement truck. My quads, hips, calves, and even upper back are all killing me. I truly haven't felt this sore after a marathon since I ran my first one 10 years ago. It could have been the racing flats that I wore, or it could have been the fact that I ran the last 9 miles or so on severely cashed out legs, but I've decided that I'm going to blame that stupid bike. I hate that bike.
Here are the splits:
