Success is defined by our expectations. This is why, in spite of slower times and fewer age group awards, I’m considering this year to not be so bad. Yes, I’ve been managing those expectations better than ever. Not my training or weight or general running ability, mind you, but how I view those things.
For the River Run ½ Marathon, I thought that I was setting reasonable, achievable expectations when I set my goals as: I ought to be able to do sub-1:30, I should be able to do sub-1:29, and if things go really well, I might be able to do sub-1:28. There – that should be doable, no? After 42 and 41 minute 10K’s and that 67 flat 10-miler, I sure thought so.
That explains the expectations. And the two runs? Well, that’s easy. The logistics for the River Run are difficult at best. No race day registration or packet pickup. Either park at the start and take a shuttle bus back after the finish, or park a few miles from the finish and shuttle both to the start and from the finish back to your car. Having done this race a few times, I’ve learned that, believe it or not, the latter option is the better one. And that’s what I was going to do, until something hit me the morning of the race as I was about to drive up there. I could park at the start, and just run back after the finish! I wanted to get a long run in sometime, so why not do 26 today?
It was warm, rainy and humid at the start. I didn’t know there would be pace groups, but I found myself running with the 1:30 group for the first couple miles. This was a good thing: start conservatively. The race winds through the absolutely beautiful – even in the rain - Cleveland Metroparks. After a 3 or 4 miles, the rain tapered off, and it seemed to get a few degrees warmer. And even more humid. I told myself that I could handle this, as I pulled away from the pace group with some 6:40-ish miles.
In those middle miles, I passed a lot of people, and was mostly running alone. Mile 6 went by in something like 40:40, and I thought things were going quite well. This, of course, is when things started to not go quite so well. The 6:40-ish miles became 6:55-ish ones. That pace group, now much smaller, went by me at about mile 11. I tried mightily to keep them in sight. I hit mile 12 in 1:22:30, and knew that I just had to do those last 1.1 miles in 7:30 or better in order to salvage this run into something I could call decent. The best I could do was to cross the line in 1:30:0x, with my only hope that my chip time would be better.
Now my legs felt as dead as can be, and somehow, I had to run back to the start. Well, I didn’t really have to. I could still take the bus. I wrestled with myself as I was trying to take in some calories and liquids, knowing that the longer I stood around, the better chance I had of just getting on a bus. So without any further thought, I just started jogging back.
It would be 12 miles; I’d skip the extra 1-mile detour into Berea, but I would still be able to call it a 26-mile day because of my warmup. And those first two sure were difficult. There were other runners also doing a cool-down, but I was alone, for this direction, after the 11-mile aid station. And After stopping at those aid stations, I started running better again. Not good, just better. Maybe 8:40 miles instead of 9:00+ ones. It wasn’t long before I saw the last few slower runners coming towards me. I had tried to stay mostly off the road, out of everyone’s way. “Hey, you’re going the wrong way!” Oh – now they tell me. The volunteers were taking down the 10-mile aid station, and soon I had to share the road with traffic. I ran on the bike path at times, but moved to the road when I thought it was shorter. I certainly didn’t want to run MORE than 26 miles!
I made other stops for water and bathroom breaks, and also to look out at a scenic lookout near Berea. The last few miles were slower and slower: back to the 9:30-ish range. I had earlier picked up an (unopened) GU packet and now used it to get through that last mile. I made it back in something like 1:46.
Checking the results, I learned that I was 4th in my age group (story of the year for me), and that my chip time was 1:29 something. I guess I cut those expectations a bit too close this time.
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