The 2013 New York Marathon

Finally.

I think I first thought about running the New York Marathon shortly after I finished the Boston Marathon in 2009. It was a long path from then until now:

• I was injured as a result of my 2009 Boston Marathon, and was off running for nearly 6 months
• I spent 2010 rebuilding, making an attempt to qualify for New York in the Fall by running the San Jose Half. I missed by over two minutes.
• I qualified for 2012 with a February 2011 Kaiser Half.
• I ran the 2011 Seattle Marathon to clear off any marathon rust
• As I trained for the 2012 New York Marathon, I developed minor stress fractures at two different times and cancelled my entry (and the race was cancelled by Tropical Storm Sandy anyway)
• I ran the 2013 Avenue of the Giants marathon as a make-good for 2012

Then, as I was preparing for the 2013 New York Marathon, I had more injuries, ones that shut me down for four of the five critical weeks of my training program. I did a hasty return to form, which went quite well, and I decided to run the marathon despite the reduced training. I used a few test-pace runs to establish what I might be capable of, and settled on a goal of 3:10 (which would require me to run 7:15 per mile).

The Trip

As I did for Boston, I flew three days before the race. That allowed me to try to adjust to the time change on Thursday night when I arrived, go to the Expo on Friday, sleep the good sleep on Friday Night/Saturday morning (do nothing all day long), and be properly rested for race day on Sunday. I also got to spend some time with old friends Damijan, Monique and Ivan, visit MoMA, and generally become reacquainted with Manhattan.

Race Morning

I won't dwell on the specifics. Let's just say that I had some advice designed to minimize the time I would spend outside in the cold waiting for the start of the race. Unfortunately, enormous crowds delayed every part of the process, and instead of it taking 45 minutes from South Ferry to the starting area, it took me just under two hours. I missed the cutoff for getting into my assigned wave, meaning that I would be running with people who were certainly slower than I am. I also missed out on making one last visit to a port-a-potty, as I had reached the front of the corral and didn't understand how much time I now had to wait.

Dejected for a bit, I tried to just resolve to run my race.

The starting line

Miss New York sang America the Beautiful and some fellow who is obviously a professional announcer of sorts announced the start of my section of my wave. You see, this race is so big that they start each wave along three separate paths which join together after 8 miles. My section was Blue. A Howitzer Canon went off and my race started, 25 minutes behind the first wave.

The Start

We began at the foot of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, effectively starting in Staten Island but running through none of it. In my opinion, running across a bridge sucks. All bridges I've run on bow upwards towards the center, meaning there's a hill, the wind is generally awful, and you can't really see any grand vistas. This bridge was much the same. 1 mile uphill to start, which I had planned to run about 10 seconds faster than my split showed.

Mlle 1: 7:40

It was at this point that I discovered that the different paths (labelled by color, Orange, Blue and Green), did not immediately line up in terms of distance, since I passed by a mile marker that was labelled Blue and then ten or more yards later, another on the other side of the highway of the bridge labelled Orange. Mysteriously, a few runners were taking the opportunity to join the Orange path by running through the rare break in the divider between the sides of the bridge -- and I could not understand that, as it was clear to me they had just chosen to make their race longer. In fact, I tried to bend my mind such that it would make sense for someone to cut over, but I just couldn't. It's like solving a logic problem and then rethinking it a lot. A lot. But simply: if you've already run a mile, and then you go to the side that hasn't yet reached the first mile marker, you've just added some distance to your race.

The downward direction of the Verrazano-Narrows was, well, downhill, and I had planned to pick up the pace a little. At this point, the other runners I was with were largely moving pretty fast, so the pacing was my own and maybe they dragged me along with them. 20 seconds fast!

Mile 2: 6:41

Now, the plan was to settle in and run 7:13s pretty much for the next 20 miles, with a couple of exceptions. As we exited the bridge and turned up Fourth Ave in Brooklyn, the crowd was lining the street… thickly. And they were pretty loud. I started to scan the crowd a bit, but mostly I put my head down and tried to lock in a pace.

Mile 3: 7:16

Not a bad first mile for the pace I was shooting for. I kept going, trying to settle in a slightly faster pace, feeling fine but not especially gliding through the streets of Brooklyn. I started to try to look for Damijan and Monique, but I couldn't remember precisely where on Fourth Ave they said they would be, nor could I know what side of the road they'd be on, and the crowd was just too thick and noisy with occasional music for me to see or hear anyone cheering. Well, unless you were a particularly loud person.

The was a cold headwind, and I didn't feel quite warm enough to start shedding my Tyvek Jacket, but I ripped the sleeves off nonetheless. (Actually, I fought a bit with the sleeves, as my perforations were insufficient for a simple yank to remove them as I had at CIM… still, they came off, leaving me with a Tyvek vest).

Mile 4: 7:15

At this point, I was now weaving my way through some runners. I was a bit confused: I started near the front of this wave, and only the people who ran faster than me from the start would be in front of me, so where were these people coming from? In retrospect, they must have been from the very back of the first wave, but I didn't know how long the start of the first wave would take, and I could only assume that I had already caught people who started 20 minutes before me. It didn't make sense, but it meant that I was now diverting some of my effort to navigate and find lines between runners.

Mile 5: 7:14

I was supposed to take my first GU at the five mile mark, but my stomach was feeling a bit full. I had had a larger than usual breakfast since it was three hours before the race, but not getting another chance for the bathroom before the race left me feeling it. And so I waited. I did, however, pull the Tyvek vest open and work it off my arms. Weaving my way through runners, I clocked a pretty solid split.

Mile 6: 7:10

I continued that pace for the next mile, starting to try to see if I could see Damijan and Monique in the crowd. Was it fourth street? That was coming up. But as the numbered streets passed, I put my head back down and continued on. I took my first GU, though my stomach was feeling a bit tight.

Mile 7: 7:10

The last of Fourth Ave was much like the rest. Streets lined with people, cheering loudly, and some sparse runners to pick through. Not very scenic, until we made a left turn to angle up Atlantic Avenue, and I could see the Citibank and Chrysler buildings in Manhattan in the distance. Cool. But we weren't to cross into Manhattan for a while…? 

Mile 8: 7:23

I saw my split for this mile and felt concerned, as I didn't know why it was slower. Had I lost focus? Now the separate paths of the marathon all converged, and as we turned onto Lafayette, the path was narrower, too. I was now having to be more active in my attempt to run faster than most everyone, weaving my way through the crowd of runners and pushing the pace. And during this, I opened my foil packet to unwrap an S-Cap that I would take to try to forestall the

cramps that plagued each marathon since Boston.

Mile 9: 7:09

Now, I was cooking. I was getting the pace right and making my way through the crowds. We turned onto Bedford Ave as I kept the pace. My legs were feeling fine, I just wished my stomach was empty.

Mile 10: 7:08

I continued on Bedford Ave. At a bend in the road, I heard someone on a loudspeaker encouraging a runner ahead of me, who was carrying a sizable American flag, to hold that flag up high… "You're in Williamsburg now… that's how we do." Curving through Williamsburg, I lost track of that pace and notched a slower than target mile.

Mile 11: 7:18

The road has a slight downhill here, and as I weaved through more runners, sometimes taking an elbow, I went a bit faster. My stomach was still feeling tight and I put off taking my second GU.

Mile 12: 7:02

Zigzagging from Manhattan Ave to Greenpoint Ave to McGuiness Blvd., I continued working my way, passing runners, bumping into the same one twice as I passed her at a corner.  I thought about having another GU… now would be a good time, but my stomach still felt tight.

Mile 13: 7:16

I reached the halfway mark and realized that my water bottle was still more than a third full -- normally I drink more water than this. But I also looked at my overall split for the first half and noted that I was maybe 30 seconds behind my plan for the first half, but solidly ahead of my goal pace overall. (I knew I had allowed for some extra time for the hilly finish.) I continued zigzagging through Queens, feeling reasonably good overall. However, as we went over the Pulaski bridge, I misunderstood where we were and thought for a second that we were on Roosevelt Island for some reason.

Mile 14: 7:18

I came around to Queens Blvd, a bit worried about the last two splits, but not thinking that a few seconds per mile was going to make much of a difference. 

Mile 15: 7:37

Next came the Queensborough bridge, with the anticipation of reaching Manhattan on the other side. Everything fell quiet, and I fought to pick my way through a thick crowd of runners, trying to give solid effort uphill.

My left contact was starting to feel like it was loose in my eye. I had had this happen on long runs before, and it had always been somewhat of an illusion. But it felt watery and like it wasn't fully in my eye.

I worked to run fast on the downhill section and listened for the crowd… reaching the mile marker

Mile 16: 7:16

…then tuned up 1st Ave. Oh my, the crowd was thick and loud! Fortunately, 1st Ave is wider here and it was easier to run through the slower runners.

I started to think about seeing Ivan or Damijan, and realized it was just impossible. So many faces in the crowd, so many runners! Chaos, really. Noisy, so many people… just felt like chaos. Nonetheless, I tried to stay closer to the left side and look for Ivan in his Angels jacket. There was lots of red.

Mile 17: 7:18

I was near the middle of the road when a woman on my right (whom I was passing) suddenly veered directly left like she had seen someone on the sidelines, then yelled at me because we half-collided. Uh, yeah. Run a straight line and get blamed when someone acts erratically!

Generally, though, I was feeling pretty solid and cruised down the avenue. I began to watch the street signs...  71, 72, 73… 85, 86, 87…

Mile 18: 6:58

It was about this point that I began to give up hope of seeing or being seen by anyone. I tried to put my head down and run (I had just notched a fast split), and I was pleased that while my pacing was a tiny bit slow per mile (except the last one), I was pretty pleased with how my legs felt and how I felt like I had some energy.

Mile 19: 7:13

Up through Harlem and to the Willis Ave. Bridge -- uphill, slow going. I mean, like a total momentum-killer. It was a short bridge, thankfully.

A breeze came up as we came off the bridge into the Bronx, and my contact lens from left my eye simply floated away on a breeze. I saw its shape as it left my eye -- I could see the thing floating away! Gone. I could still see enough from my right eye's contact, but just not perfect. Gads.

There was a big video screen overhead, and man, it was just this huge mass of runners!

Mile 20: 7:37

A discouraging split. I had not taken the bridge well. 

The course through the Bronx was a zigzag of turns, and that's not a fast way to go, either. I tried to push the pace some, and after crossing back into Manhattan, I was beginning to have a taste for the race being over. I couldn't see particularly well and got a little disoriented at one point when we started to buttonhook around Marcus Garvey Park, and then I realized that I had missed the 21 mile marker, and I didn't even read my watch correctly, thinking that I had run the two miles about 30 seconds faster than my watch told me.

Mile 21/22: 7:30 per mile

Now, it was time for the long hill up Fifth Avenue.

I knew I  had only a few miles left, and here the crowd of runners was just as thick. Despite trying to weave through them, I couldn't run fast enough.

Mile 23: 7:35

I pushed some, but again, it was now a lot harder to navigate through the pack of runners.

I headed Into the park, knowing the end was coming, but still a couple miles away.

Mile 24: 8:07

And….  I sort of gave up. 

I saw the 8 minute split.

I just didn't see any point in pushing so hard when I knew I wasn't going to be under 3:10 and probably no where really close, either. 

I was tired of forcing my way through the crowd, and I just wanted the race over with.

Mile 25: 8:02

Yep. I was more or less coasting along side the slow runners, and I was grateful to see the 25 mile marker.

I could sense the turn onto Central Park South coming, knowing that once I got there, it would soon be over.

I saw a sign saying 400m left. 

I saw the 26 mile marker. 

Mile 26: 7:54

I saw a sign showing 100m left. Raised my arm up for the cameras as I crossed the finish, hit stop on my watch and didn't even look at the time.

Walked forward, glad to be done.

----

From about 67th street inside the park, i had to walk all the way up to 77th Street for "early exit". I tried to drink the Gatorade Protein Drink (the taste was nasty), ate the Power Bar, glad to see "20g of Protein" boldly enough on the packaging that I could read it with my blurry vision.

Finally, out of the park and walking down CPW, finally given the promised poncho. Now walking the 15 blocks to get to the Reunion area to meet Damijan, and looking ahead before the dip in CPW. The sight was the most amazing I had seen: an abandoned street with buildings looming to the right, nothing on the street but hooded people wearing identical, bright orange cloaks, staggering forward slowly. It was like a scene out of some post-apocolyptic movie. 

I met with Damijan and his friend Bob (and Bob's family), and starting unloading my stuff, glad to be shedding things and getting into my warm clothes.

Lots of walking later that day. Turned out that I walked about 7 or 8 miles in addition to running the 26.2. A shade under 48,000 steps on the day.

---

On to the graphs, shall we?

First, how consistently did I run the first 20 miles?

Very. Except that bump at mile 15, I was hitting in a pretty tight range around my desired pace of 7:13 or so, just a few seconds higher in most miles.

How did that compare to my plan?

Kind of all over the place, and in particular, even though I allocated more time for the last miles, I was far slower than planned. To be fair, my plan wasn't based on a particularly precise understanding of the course, but you could still see how I was flopping around my targets a fair bit.

So, how was I doing towards meeting my goal, per my plan?

Not so bad, in that I was still on target to meet my goal after 19 miles. I drifted increasingly and consistently away from my goal from that point on, however. 

Now, on to Heart Rate!

This chart starts out pretty similar to the typical pattern: high at first, then settling in and consistent towards the middle. However, it starts to drop in the final miles (when I "gave up"), and it doesn't show that I was physically tired or maxing myself out. No, this pretty much says that I was mentally tired, or my legs were tired. 

However, my legs have felt pretty good since the race. It is hard for me to wrap my head around what this chart is telling me.

Especially when I compare to prior races:

See, I started lower and stayed lower than every race (except Seattle), and I was a bit worried after Seattle that I hadn't pushed hard enough at the end. Here, I have the added concern that I was pushing harder the entire way just this past spring at the Avenue of the Giants. 

So, what was the deal?

I prefer to believe that the four weeks I missed were the main factor, and the running through slower runners was the secondary factor. 

The four weeks I dealt with injury (plus a fifth building back slowly) amounted to 243 fewer miles of training in tail end of the training plan. I ran less than half of the miles that I had planned to run.

And one cannot underestimate the extra strain it places on a runner to be constantly trying to thread his way through other runners. 

So I feel quite mixed: was my effort poor, was my conditioning poor, or was the missing-my-wave a tragedy?

I prefer to look at it from a greater distance. 3:13:30, my official time, is not that much off from the 3:10 I thought I could run, and it also isn't horribly off from the 3:05 I ran in the Spring. Given the injury and the time off, I can be proud to have delivered a solid marathon, and I'll be back out on the road for #9 some time in 2014.