Weekend Update/Lewis and Clark 1/2 Marathon Race Recap

Hope everyone had a nice relaxing weekend! Haven’t had much time to look around for any good running news, but saw this tidbit that Paula Radcliffe will be running the World Half Marathon Championships right before NYC presumably as a test run to see if she is ready to go. Sounds like everyone is getting ready for an exciting fall marathon season, including myself, so let’s get right into it:

First, received an email on Friday from Steve DeKoker of Brooks Running accepting me into the Brooks ID Program, so I am now partially sponsored by Brooks Running!!! Basically, I am now “contractly obligated” to wear Brooks apparel/shoes exclusively, and have to do my best to promote their wonderful product to the running community through racing and local events, as well as participate in Brooks events when available. Pretty exciting stuff, and kind of cool since my running group is already sponsored by Brooks so have a little bit of a head start on apparel and shoes which I will now get in a nice discount :)

Wed, felt like crap early so we pushed back the run till late. Legs were soooo tight and sore, ended up doing a whooping 2 and calling it a night. Was a little humid outside but breeze certainly helped. Wanted to take it easy with the upcoming race, so did corework and massive stretching afterwards.

Friday morning, woke up to do a tempo run (we switched Thursday and Friday days off), walked about 50 feet before turning around and going to bed! Was soooo tired, and just decided to do later on after work. Kind of regretted the decision later, as it was hot and humid (mid 80’s) when I got home. The purpose of this workout was a short simulation run for the half marathon coming up and just a basic speed workout since we hadn’t had too many of these lately. Legs were ok – definitely felt better after a day and a half rest, so went at it. Because of time constraints with dinner later, skipped the warmup (ugh). First mile, was very tight, kind of felt weird moving at tempo for some reason. Hills were sort of grueling, and sun was a bit of a factor. Got on the trail, got into a better rhythm but was definitely hot. Coming back on the last mile, lower back was starting to hurt, was laboring a bit and didn’t feel too hot in general so slowed it down a little. Cooled down a mile coming home, was happy to have that over with. Total mileage: 4 miles – splits were: 6:34, 6:39, 6:48.

Had a nice dinner with Pat and Crystal afterwards (Crystal made healthy homemade pizza, which I was happy to contribute to by picking up Greek Kessari Cheese for the recipe!), watched Spirit of the Marathon again for motivation coming into the race and last hard training week. Saturday morning, woke up bright and early for a quick 2 mile run on the trails. Was cool outside, did a quick out and back at a slow recovery pace. Nothing crazy to note, Crystal was the recipient this time of running through a spider web on the trail then had the unhappy web owner spider crawling all over her shoulder. We saw Bambi’s 4 brothers and sisters as well. Nice, easy, quick run – happy to get it out of the way. Afterwards, went to Forest Park to volunteer with my running group who was hosting the Forest Park Cross Country Festival, which hosted a ton of high schools competing in various cross country races throughout the day. I was stationed at the awards tent, and gave out awards to the winners of the open race. We sat in a shaded tent at the finish, so I seriously had the best of all worlds – got to give out medals to the award winners, and watch all the exciting finishes to the races. Cool part of the morning – got to meet Brian Sell, fellow Brooks teammate and 2008 U.S. Olympian, and talk to him for a few minutes – AWESOME!!! Laid low the rest of the day – watched football, hung out with various friends. Tried to get myself geared up for tomorrow's race.

Race Morning

Woke up bright and early, ate a bowl of Cheerios, and headed over to Pat and Crystal’s. Was pretty tired, but excited to race this morning. We had discussed our race strategy of running a little faster than marathon pace then getting a couple in later, but I had a feeling that Crystal was feeling good (based on recent training runs), and we were going to go faster than planned so I tried to get mentally prepared for it.

Got to the race parking lot, which was in Verizon Ampitheatre, a venue that hosts concerts in the area. Parked, got changed really quick and walked towards the start. Weather was cool, but the sun hadn’t come up yet and was forecasted to be in the mid to high 70’s which was going to be warm for this type of race. Ran into a few friends, actually ran into my buddy Mike who was running, so he jumped in our group and decided to run with us for a bit.

At the Start

We lined up at the start, which was set up with minute per mile markers (faster up front), so we went to the 6 minute marker which was strangely uninhabited. Usually, everyone is in such a panic to lineup as close to the start as possible that it is seriously a crazy mob! And typically in that mob you have a lot of inexperienced, slower runners that have no business being in a fast corral and usually cause unnecessary log jams early. But we lined up with maybe 50 other people around us and had a TON of room. 4,500 runners, and we were going to start with NO problems – start of a good day, perhaps?

Race Report

Gun goes off, here we go! Was cruising pretty early, and was monitoring my Garmin to not go too crazy with pace. We were all cruising, felt really easy and going pretty quick. First mile flew by pretty fast, and quicker than I wanted so tried to slow it down a little the second mile. Felt good, picked it up slightly the third mile as we started to weave around the course a bit. Sun was starting to peek out a lot more, was getting nervous about the later miles and having to battle potential weather problems. [Miles 1-3 Splits: 6:34, 6:45, 6:41]

Right after the 3^rd mile, you actually horseshoe back so we got to see a ton of the runners that were behind us. Pretty fun because everyone is just cheering for everybody, and was good motivation to keep going strong. Picked it up slightly, ran into another buddy so ran with him for a little bit, talked with Crystal a little and realized my worst fears were confirmed that she was gunning for a PR, thus changing my mindset of a simple training run into becoming a pacer for her. Felt kind of tired, but ok for the most part. Was thinking of the major hill I saw on the course map coming up later, so was trying to save a bit for that. Next couple miles flew by, finally started to hit the hill and we passed a few people on it. Hill was long and not too terribly steep, but was tired from it. Saw Pat on the top of the hill which was a huge confidence boost, surged on the downhill. [Miles 4-6 Splits: 6:38, 6:38, 6:38]

Coming down, relaxed my stride but looked forward to see Mt. Everest coming up – UGH! Looong, steep hill which was actually a bridge over a river, and I knew Crystal’s hill tactics were “attack”, so mentally prepared for that. Passed a couple more runners, spectators let us know that Crystal was the 6^th or 7^th female at that point. Was nice to finally reach the top and get my legs back to “regular, tired” mode instead of “climbing up a hill – burning” mode. Hit the downhill hard, saw a GU station so grabbed one and took it down. Was getting pretty hot at this point, so figured I would need it for later. Turned onto a road, and ran on that for a couple miles. Was a slight incline, running right into a stiff breeze. Felt better after the GU, told Crystal to work off me and jumped ahead of her so she could draft off me. At this point, one of our teammates had caught back up to us and were working off us as well. Kind of got carried away with pace a bit later on as I started to gap them but slowed down when Crystal called me out. Turned right onto another road surrounded by cornfield which we ran up a hill into the sun, into the wind. There was a pack of runners about 100 yards ahead, but they were too far ahead for us to be working off them. Was tired at this point, but helped to be running in a group. [Miles 7-9 Splits: 6:42, 6:44, 6:44]

Finally got to some flatter ground, was weaving on some roads headed back to downtown St. Charles where the finish was. Sun was out in full force, so was definitely sweating bullets at this point and couldn’t hit the water/sports drink stops fast enough. Felt tired, but was pushing my mind to focus and keep pace. Right around mile 11, could feel us slowing down a little which helped regain some juice and mentally prepare for the last couple miles. Still working with our teammate, but she pulled ahead with another guy on the 12^th mile which left Crystal and I. At this point, just wanted to get to that last mile where I knew I would be 100% fine. Crystal was struggling, mainly because there weren’t many water stops towards the end of the race, but we kept pushing along. Hit downtown, saw the finish line coming up so was ready to have a strong finish. Felt pretty decent at this point, pumped a bit from the crowd cheering so started to ham it up a bit. Got to the last 100-200 yards, saw she was going to be fine, then just took off for a little kick to end the race. [Miles 10-13.1 Splits: 6:40, 6:46, 6:49]. Final time: 1:28:24

RESULTS

Peter Kim M29

Clock Time 1:28:24

Chip Time 1:28:32

Overall Place 55/4481
Gender Place 47/?
Division Place 11/230

Pace 6:45/Mile

Final Thoughts

Pretty ecstatic to run sub 1:29, and was a good race on a day I wasn’t feeling 100%. Battled through a lot of tiredness, but finished strong. Pretty sure the course was a little long, but not too concerned about it. Crystal finished 8 seconds behind in a tremendous minute and a half PR, and we found out later she won her age group!!! Congratulations Crystal!!! Hung out a little bit after the race and talked to a few friends. Found out Mike PRed and ran sub 1:30, so really happy for him too! Went home, got in a quick 2 mile cooldown, stretched and enjoyed a post race beer and pretty much rested the rest of the day :)

So was a good running week – 34 miles, and a great race. Happy to see I haven’t lost much speed, and am starting to really trust the training program. Ready to jump into our last hard training weeks before taper time!!!

Brian Sell and I

Coming up the first of 2 hills

Down the home stretch!

Me with the big Age Group winners