Last Sunday, I tackled my
first marathon of 2012, the Poconos “Run for the Red” Marathon. (The “Red” in the title being the American
Red Cross.) My stated goal for this
whole year has been to get back to something resembling “speed” and to try and
set some new Personal Records at a handful of distances. As I creep towards 40 (and ten years of race-running),
I know there aren’t all that many PRs left in my future. I want to maximize my results now, while I
can, before I turn my attention to other types of running goals.
I felt I had slacked on
my training in the last 18 months. I was
still doing the “quantity”, but not nearly as much of the “quality” miles (meaning
plenty of long, slow runs, but not enough tempo training, no real speed work). In December, I started making some changes in
my training.
My efforts have already
paid off this year. I ran my first track
meet and set personal marks in the Mile and the 800 Meters. I PR’ed the Half-Marathon in March, beating
my previous best from 5 years before. I
also, technically, set a new 10K PR in the first 6.2 miles of that same half-marathon,
shaving 40 seconds off a time that was 6 years old. I should also have a new 5K PR, but
unfortunately the course I ran on May 12th was marked about 150 meters too long,
so my official time does not reflect how well I ran. (I’ll give another go at the distance next
month.)
Each of those achievements,
though very satisfying, come with a small caveat: I’ve rarely run those distances
in the last few years. The Marathon is where
I placed focus. Thus, it’s a new
Marathon PR that always stands as the brass ring. Indeed, it was my slightly mediocre
performances in the Chicago and New York Marathons last fall that prodded me
back to speed work and higher quality running.
I’m not above stacking
the deck a little in my favor, either.
To that end, I took a suggestion I saw printed in Runner’s World
Magazine over the winter: Try the Poconos Marathon for a speedy downhill race. The course drops more than 1200 feet from
start to finish on wooded rural roads.
Math and simple physics shows that a runner traveling 26.2 miles down a
1200 foot decline will be roughly 7 minutes faster than the same runner on a
flat course. It’s never as simple as
that, of course, but the prospects were very enticing.
I talked my friend, Lynn,
into committing to the race as well. I
just helped her run her first marathon on a trail-based course this past
Thanksgiving, but she’d never run a road race.
I thought she might enjoy the rural course and the small race field of
the Poconos event. After a little
thinking, she jumped in and we began separate training schedules.
After my strong
half-marathon in March, I added a weekly track session to my routine. I was pleased with my performance on those
nights. The two 20-milers I went out for
didn’t go as smoothly, but I decided there were extraneous circumstances on
each of those runs, and all of my other long runs were good ones. So, it would all come down to the problem of
solving the mysteries of the Poconos’ course on race day.
The basic math – the drop
in elevation, the boost in running pace – seemed to make the choice to run this
event a no-brainer, but on closer inspection the Poconos course presents some
difficulties. There is a helpful drop in elevation, but the bulk of that drop is complete
by the time you’ve reached 17.5 miles.
The next 7 miles are, literally, an up and down affair with a long
series of rolling hills. None are
“steep”, but I don’t think they classify as “gentle”, either, especially
because they come after you’ve already run 19 miles.
The other obstacle we
faced was the weather. The forecast for
race day was for lows in the 50s, but a high of 83 with plenty of
sunshine. I hoped Lynn and I would both
be across the finish line before the worst of the heat set in, but the temps
looked as though they’d reach, at least, into the high 70s for the last hour of
our race. Not ideal.
I’ve had a lot of bad
luck with the weather as a marathoner.
Before the Poconos I’d run 14 road-based marathons. Two of them were in a sub-40 freeze. 6 were run in uncomfortable, if not stifling,
heat. Only twice has the weather been
ideal for me - temps that stay in the 50s from start to finish, clouds to shield
the sun. At both races I set new
PRs. How I long for a marathon when the
weather does not factor into my performance.
In retrospect, I can also
admit that an unfamiliar course is not the best place to shoot for a marathon
PR. The more unknowns you can eliminate
on race day the better off you’ll be achieving your goals. Neither a course map nor an elevation chart
will tell you the whole story. Even
driving the course isn’t really enough.
You’ve got to feel the route under your feet. You’ve gotta know what it means to run that
thing in the morning on race day. Where
are the sneaky inclines? Where are the
sun-exposed miles? What does the distance between water stops feel like? It was
a risk to go to the Poconos for the first time with a PR in mind.
Given the unfriendly
forecast, it was a relief to walk outside our hotel on race morning – we were
staying less than a mile from the finish line – and feel the chilly morning
air. It was tempting to think that
somehow the heat would hold off until the afternoon, post-race, but by the time
we drove up the mountain to the start, the weather had already changed. As we milled about at 7am, the sun shone
brightly and the air temp was already in the 60s. I didn’t need any extra layers to keep warm
and by the time I finished a short jog to shake off the last of my sleep, I had
begun to work up some sweat. I expected
it to be cooler up on the mountain, not warmer.
In the weeks before the
race, as the weather forecast developed and I examined and re-examined the
course elevation profile. I formulated
some race tactics. I felt I could count
on a strong performance in the first 20 miles.
That’s where most of the downhill was and also when the weather would be
coolest. The ups and downs on the last
quarter of the course, coupled with a – potentially – very hot late morning sun
made the last 10K a bit of a crap shoot.
I decided it was better to aim for a little extra speed early, take
advantage of all those downhills, and maybe outrun the heat a little bit.
This goes against the
common mantra to not “go out too fast”, but I wasn’t planning anything
crazy. Based on the way the course is
structured, I felt the strategy made good sense. It’s not the kind of course you generally run
a negative split on (running the second half faster than the first). It was logical to plan for a late-race slow
down. Why not use it and bank a few
minutes in the first 20 miles?
My marathon PR, set in
May 2009, was 3:44 and change. At the
very least, I wanted a new PR. I thought
I had an excellent shot at breaking 3:40, and that’s what I was aiming at, what
I was expecting. If the day went extremely
well, I thought I could crack 3:35. (And
if, by some chance, a miracle occurred, I might see the south side of 3:30, but
that miracle would have to include the weather, and I thought that very
unrealistic.) If I could cover the first
20 miles in 2 hours and 45 minutes (an 8:15 per mile pace), then, even if I
slowed down to 8:50 miles, I would still finish with a sub-3:40. The heat would be a big variable though, so I
felt my race was really in those first 20 miles. Up ‘til then, I could control things
somewhat. After that point, I’d let the
chips fall where they may.
About 10 minutes before
the 8 a.m. start, Lynn could stand around no more, took one last round of hugs
and went to line up back near the 4:30 pace group. My girlfriend, Jen, Lynn’s husband Wally, and
our close friend Melissa all made the drive out to Pennsylvania to support the
both of us. This is the same 5-person
group who turned out to get Lynn through her first marathon in the Bronx last
Thanksgiving Day. All four were also in
Ohio with me last August for my (failed) attempt at the Burning River 100
(along with my sister, and my friends Sean & Amy and Ryan). The five of us must have a thing going. I lingered a few more minutes with our crew,
but soon took my own round of hugs and found my spot among the other runners.
The pace groups were led
by volunteers wearing bright, neon pink shirts and holding little signs with
finish times and pace printed. I lined
up behind the 3:35/8:12 per mile pace group.
Mostly, I just wanted to be in front of the 3:40 group, but I wanted to
start with the 3:35 kids and see how I felt.
Just after 8 o’clock, the
start gun went off, and less than a minute later I crossed the start line.
For the last 6 months
I’ve been using a GPS watch on my runs.
It’s not a completely accurate device, but it’s a handy tool. It gives me a fair estimate of distance and
average pace. I turned off the automatic
split option for this race. I would
record my own splits by pushing the button every time I ran past a mile
marker. The device usually measures my
miles a little short and estimates my pace to be a little faster than actual. In that first mile after the start, it
reported a sharp, low 8-minute-per-mile pace, but I knew to disregard that, and
besides, the pace felt very slow. There
was, as always, a little crowding in those early meters. None of us quite had room to really run, yet. My legs weren’t completely awake and we hadn’t
even reached a significant downhill stretch.
I expected to clock that first mile in, maybe 8:35 or so. I was more than a little surprised to pass
the 1st mile marker, hit the split button, and look down at my watch
to read an “8:04”.
“Huh”, I thought – but
the first mile of a marathon doesn’t mean all that much. I just held steady, checked that my breathing
still felt “easy” and stayed behind the pace group. My second mile split was exactly 8
minutes. Interesting.
The first 5 miles of the
race are basically flat. There’s a
little up and a little down, but no real net elevation lost. The drop doesn’t begin until miles 6 and
7. The route follows a series of state
highways that lead from Lake Pocono back to downtown Stroudsburg. Most of those roads are lined with thick
green trees and in the morning hours they offer copious amounts of shade. Despite the warmer-than-hoped-for weather, it
was still comfortable in that 8 o’clock hour.
At mile 3, I clocked a slightly more expected 8:19. Mile 4 showed an 8:17. But then at mile 5, before we began any
notable downhill running, I clocked a relatively easy 7:52.
Now it was ON. A sub-8 split, 5 miles in, run with that
little stress, could not be a fluke. Now
I believed in the way I was running, and felt I had found a happy zone where I
could push “just enough” without pushing too hard. I was still traveling with the 3:35 group and
for the next few miles I stayed tucked in behind them. I clocked 8:04, 8:04, 7:49 (on an especially
steep mile down Route 314), 8:04, 8:04 and 8:06. Those first 11 miles could not have gone any
better. Jen, Wally & Melissa were
waiting to see me for the first time just after mile 9. I ran by them calling out “72:45 at mile 9!
72:45 at mile 9!” in the hopes they’d see I was moving a little faster than
we’d expected. Their happy faces were
good to see, whether they understood me or not.
At mile 12, I logged an
8:22, but it was an aberration and the next 4 miles read: 8:10, 8:14, 8:09 and
8:03. Along the way, I crossed the half-way
mat in 1:46:24, the best 1st half of any marathon I’ve run.
Jen, Melissa and Wally
were waiting for me again just past 16.5 miles.
Once again, I flew past, strong and still very optimistic, but there I
faced a key turning point in the race.
Just past the 17 mile marker is – for all intents and purposes – the bottom
of the hill. There is still a net
elevation loss from that point to the finish, but, compared to the 1200+ feet
you’ve already dropped down, what’s left to lose is extremely subtle. What you DO notice is that suddenly you’re
running uphill a lot. Just about every time you get a little
decline, it’s returned with an equal or greater incline. So, somewhere in the 18th mile,
the party is over.
There are some long,
steady climbs in those next few miles, but I held pretty strong and clocked
8:16, 8:18, 8:32 and then an 8:39 for the 20th mile. The hills were officially rolling by then,
and yes, the late-morning heat was beginning to set in. I had run just in front of the 3:35 pace group
through 18 miles. In the 19th
they slipped past me. At 20 miles, they
had a few hundred meters on me. I maintained
my good mood, though. I had covered 20
miles in just 2 hours, 43 minutes and 44 seconds, more than a minute ahead of
my 2:45 goal. I averaged 8:11 minutes per mile to that point. With that extra 75 seconds in the bank, I
knew I could run the last 6.2 miles at an average pace of 9 minutes per mile
and still break 3:40. I was in good
position. My pace had already begun to
slip, yes, but I had earned a healthy cushion.
I was elated.
Yet, it was not to be. It was 10:45 a.m. The temperature was, by then, in the high
70s. The sun was arcing high. The morning was not yet old enough for the
humid air to have been burned away. The
stiff, rolling hills were crueler than expected. The character of my performance changed
quickly.
Unlike the weather at
Chicago the last few years, the heat didn’t come on as if someone had flicked a
switch. Instead, it crept upon me
without my notice and before I knew it, I’d been trudging along in the thick of
it for what seemed like hours. It
drained me slowly, but surely, like a vampire drinking my blood. I split the 21st mile with an 8:52
and still had hope, but in the 22nd mile I was finally reduced to
stretch of walking. The shift to a
different set of muscles after nearly 3 hours revealed a numbness in my legs. I did not feel light-headed, but I was
parched. I split the 22nd
mile with a 9:23.
I was determined to keep
moving. If I could just will myself to
keep jogging – to stay away from the walks – I might still break 3:40, but the
sun was out in force and the protective trees which had closely lined the road
for the first 20 miles of the course were mostly gone now. What trees did still stand nearby offered far
less shelter from a sun that was already directly overhead. I began taking cups of both Gatorade and
water at every aid station we passed.
(Some stations even handed out full bottles of water, which was
generous.) There was an ice stop near
mile 23. I took two large handfuls and
kept going, popping some of the ice in my mouth and simply holding onto the
rest in my fists as I ran. But still I
walked more. Still I lost time. I split the 23rd mile with a 9:47,
the 24th with 9:51 and I knew that a sub-3:40 was fully out of
reach.
I was left with only my
“C” goal: breaking my previous best and setting a new PR. I never really believed that I would fail to
crack 3:40, so I had not double checked my exact
PR. I could not recall precisely how many seconds past 3:44 I had run that day
in 2009. Now I worried that I would slow
so much that I would slip past that goal as well. Instead of having minutes to spare, now every
little second counted.
There was one last, sharp,
little hill just past the 24th mile marker. A volunteer at its top assured us that no
other hills remained on the course. A
lot of people say encouraging things like this to runners during a
marathon. They are often untrue. This man, however, was adamant, and the tone
of his voice was one of experience, of truth.
I wish I could say that some momentum came along with the relief I
received at that point, but it did not.
The heat denied me that. I never did
quite lose my stubborn, though. I
allowed myself a short walk, and then I forced myself back into a jog/trot.
At 24 miles, my total
time was roughly 3 hours, 22 minutes. My
pace had slowed to nearly 10 minute miles.
The temperature was over 80, the heat index still higher and my internal
thermometer, higher still. I had 2.2
miles left to go on mostly flat roads, but under a steamy midday sun. (Even
Jen, Melissa and Wally would later confess that they were hot and sweaty just
standing around and watching for us.) I
was desperate to finish in less than 3:44, but it would require some push. How terrible would it be to waste those first
20 brilliant, easy, breezy miles?
I did not move quickly,
but I kept my feet going at a jog. Just
before I reached the 25th mile marker, we made the turn off of the
small back-streets of Stroudsburg onto the one real thoroughfare, Main
Street. My split at 25 was a 9:58. The next mile would be the longest mile I
ever ran in my life.
Before the Poconos, the
final mile (or 1.2 miles) of every marathon (or ultra) I’ve ever run has been a
boost, a relief, a burden removed. The
23rd mile, the 24th, the 25th – those are the
hardest miles, those are the miles when you begin to question the depths of
your own sanity, when you ask yourself, “Why?” and find it difficult to
answer. That’s not how it was for me in
Stroudsburg. I thought the 26th
mile was never, ever going to end. I
kept looking at my watch, counting as the minutes, the seconds continued
spinning away. It was hard to think
straight. With somewhere less than a ¾
mile to go I was forced to walk again. I
needed a short rest to try and recharge for the last push to the finish.
I could see the high
school – where we would finish with a lap around the track inside the football
stadium – looming off to our right, but it barely seemed to move in my
vision. Another runner, suffering as
much as I was, asked me if we would be turning into the high school soon. I said, “I don’t know, just keep going.” I was worried about the time and
annoyed. At last, with about four-tenths
of a mile to go, we turned right on to the campus. My watch showed just under 3 hours, 40
minutes. I was nearly out of time to hit
my final goal. I tried to stop looking
at my watch and just run.
We made a left turn and I
could see the back of the stadium. Spectators
were milling about outside the building, watching runners work their way around
to the far side to enter the track. I
did not see Jen or Melissa or Wally. I
did, however, finally see the 26th mile marker placed just outside
the gate into the small stadium. I never
thought I would see that sign. I hit the
split on my watch but I did not look at it. I was frightened of what it would
show me. I had to complete nearly one
full lap of the 400 meter track. I
needed to do it before the official clock showed 3:44. While I was on the first turn, I heard my
name called out on the stadium’s loudspeaker system. I threw my left arm up in the air in the hope
that Jen and Melissa and Wally would see it, and know that I had heard, to know
that I was still pushing, to know that I wasn’t done, yet.
Along the back stretch I was
looking over my left shoulder, trying to see the event clock by the finish
line. It had taken me a short time to
cross the start line after the gun went off at the beginning of the race. There would be a small discrepancy between
the official race clock and my chip time, but I wasn’t sure how much. When I entered the final turn on the track to
head toward the finish line, both my watch and the official clock read
3:43. It was just the seconds that were
different.
Ten minutes after the
race, after Jen found a chair is a shady spot to set me down in, she quietly
told me that she saw the official clock roll over 3:44 before I had finished
and was sorry that it seemed I’d missed that goal. But I had stopped my watch at the finish line
and showed her its face. The total in
the middle read “3:43:37”.
I checked my race history
later on and was reminded that my previous best was 3:44:39. My official chip time at the Poconos was
3:43:38. So, I took a full minute off my
PR, but the truth is it was the minute tally that counted in my mind. I would have been disappointed with a
3:44:01. It’s so much easier to say you
went from a 3:44 to a 3:43 than to explain that you ran a slightly faster 3:44.
Just not as satisfying.
As soon as I crossed the
line and quit running, I discovered I could hardly walk. My legs stopped working properly and I
stub-legged-stumbled through the short finish chute to get my finisher’s medal
and a bottle of water. Dizziness overtook
me and I couldn’t see clearly. Luckily,
my senses did not leave me and there was no danger of throwing up. I was afraid to quit moving, and when I saw
Jen and Melissa on the other side of the fence, I moved as quickly as I could
out to meet them. I wanted my hugs and love, but I also wanted Jen to help hold
me up. I was managing, but everything
was beginning to look slightly askew and I worried that if someone bumped me
unexpectedly, that I might topple over.
After I was planted in my
shady seat, I started quizzing everybody about Lynn. Jen, Melissa and Wally had done a delicate
dance during the morning, seeing both Lynn and I off at the start and then
skipping forward to the designated spectator viewing areas. The different paces Lynn and I ran made this
a little tricky for them. By the time
Lynn came past each time, they had to hurry to get to the next spot down-course
before I did. They then had time to kill
before seeing Lynn, followed by another race to the next viewing spot. Parking was limited at each location,
including the finish line, and the crew only reached the stadium to see me
finish about 5 minutes before I got there.
(In fact, they had been behind the stadium looking to see me there
first, and had to scurry back inside when they heard my name called out over
the loudspeakers, “Gregory Isaac, from Brooklyn NY, is now on the track!” It
was like a personal page for the crew.)
The group said that Lynn
had looked really great each time they’d seen her, but the last spot they could
wait was at mile 16.5. That was before
the heat of the day had begun to set in.
She was on, or below, her 4:30 goal pace, but it was impossible to know
how she was still doing. It took me a
while to cool down and get past the dizzy spell, but I was watching the
official clock tick the whole time. When
it said 4:15 (12:15pm in real time) I stood up and told everyone I was doing a
lot better and thought we should go back out behind the stadium to look and
wait for Lynn.
Somebody mentioned that
she’d been running with a 4:25 pace group each time they’d seen her. Melissa got really excited when she saw a
dark-haired woman in a blue top coming around the corner around the 4:20 mark,
but it was a false alarm. Soon we saw
the 4:25 group pacer appear in her neon pink shirt, still holding her pace
group sign, but she was all alone, not a single runner within 50 yards of
her. She kept looking behind her, trying
to slow down a little, searching for anyone who still needed a little help
getting to the finish, but there was no one, the race was only for her there at
the end.
And then, 30 or 40
seconds later: Lynn. She appeared around
the corner, moving steadily, drenched with sweat, focused on the END. She did not respond to us in any way that I
could see, but she was still moving pretty well. We hollered at her and then turned swiftly
back in to the stadium to clutch the fence at various spots alongside the
finish. It takes a while to complete a
400-meter loop. Longer when it is the
last 400 meters of 42195. She still
didn’t respond to any of us yelling at her in that last stretch (if she even
heard us at all). I don’t think Lynn was feeling happy until she was actually
over the finish line, but when she did cross it, her arms went up in triumph. Her official time was 4:25:37. It was her
second marathon, her first on the roads, and 15 minutes faster than her first.
Lynn said she’d stayed
with the 4:25 pacer until she was the last runner left with her from the
original group. She herself finally
dropped off in that final miserable mile.
It was as bad for her as it was for me.
She said her legs cramped so badly along Main Street that she
worried she was going to do real damage.
She told us that, for a few moments, she seriously considered dropping
out or just walking to the end. She had
to fight off tears. Instead, though she
was miserable for most of those last 15 minutes, she pushed on and scored a
4:25. She ran a great race on a
difficult day, stayed with her team pacer for 25 miles, and ran even, 10-minute
splits for over 4 hours.
15, 20 minutes
after her finish, as we all walked back to the hotel along the race route, she
was pointing out runners, still on the course, who had started out in her pace
group. She was excited to see them and
telling us about their stories, all the while politely forgetting that she had
run so very well and out paced each of them.
We both wore our medals
around our necks as we walked with our loved ones, already recounting the day
and regaling each other with the happenings of the morning both big and
small. It was a tough day. It was a good day. PRs for all and group of good friends.
Lynn clutched her very
first foil blanket around her neck. It
wrapped her shoulders and fluttered behind her with the breeze. Almost like a
cape.
THE CAUSE:
