Running a solid marathon with triathlon training works !
A big day today ... ran the The Woodlands marathon, which is held at my hometown. I trained for this race with an experimental training program: not with a classic pure running program, but rather with the PPF triathlon base plan loosely combined with Pfitzinger’s Advanced Marathoning plan. Why? To avoid injury as I had to ramp up my training hard after an easy post-season period. And I added an additional challenge: qualify for Boston again (the first time I did was 5 years ago ... I haven’t run a stand-alone marathon ever since I raced in Boston 3 years ago ! ... only marathons that were part of an Ironman race).
The bad news: I didn’t make it ... the qualification time for my age group (40-44) is 3h10m. I missed it by 3 minutes. On the bright side: I thoroughly enjoyed the race ... somehow I’m not disappointed at all. My time wasn’t too bad ... the 3h13m of today is my second best time (and I placed 4th of my age group) ... my 3h10m PR was 5 years ago! Also, I’m convinced I can do better than today: while the weather was fantastic (cold) I didn’t go into the race in the best conditions (heavy cold and a very irritated eye that forced me to wear my glasses instead of contacts ; these mishaps snuck up on me yesterday afternoon!), plus I made the mistake that I thought I didn’t need extra sodium given that it was really chilly ... However, at mile 17 I started getting on the verge of cramping and I started to slow down. Anytime I pushed the pace back up I came dangerously close to locking up in a cramp. And to add insult to injury, the gels that I was counting on in mile 20 were not there ! They must have run out with the half marathon ... Anyway, it didn’t bug me much, as I felt pretty good during the race ... I just really love running !
And finally, one of the best parts of the race was that I ran a big chunk of it with my Belgian running buddy. The first 10 miles or so, we were actually talking while holding a 7:04 min/mile pace. Never done that! Bottomline: it was great to see I could run a solid marathon with triathlon training and I never came close to injury !!!
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Nicolas, I'm so glad you enjoyed this race despite not achieving your ultimate goal of qualifying for Boston. Your story is a great example of enjoying the day and the process over the final time. Running (fast!) with your dear friend, overcoming near cramping and no gels. All with an irritated eye. And to be reminded how much you love running...priceless.
Nice job! Mel
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