For day 14 of the Running
Ragged 20in20 Series, we were back at Quarry Park & Nature Preserve. We had the same course as yesterday. That was good for two reasons. First, I like this course. Second, I knew exactly what to expect.
I knew my friend Justin was
going to be here, and he’s much faster than me.
Knowing I wouldn’t win the race, I could just focus on pacing myself to
break five hours. In particular, I didn’t
have to worry about keeping up with anyone else in the first lap.
Today’s weather was a little
warmer than yesterday. It was about 60
degrees at the start, but it warmed up fast.
By the time I finished, it got into the mid-70s.
Yesterday, I paced myself using
variable-length walking breaks, with a target pace of 20 minutes per lap. Today, I did the same thing. For the first half of the race, I ran each
lap at a comfortable pace, and then started the next lap with a walking
break. I resumed running when the time
on my watch was a multiple of 20 minutes.
In the first lap, Justin took
the lead, followed by a runner who was doing the half marathon. Justin decided to adopt my pacing method, but
he set a target pace of 15 minutes per lap.
Yesterday, on this same course,
I only walked at the beginning of each lap.
Today, I also took a brief walking break going up a small hill near the
end of the lap. It wasn’t a long enough
hill to be tiring, but I thought walking up the hill would be easier on both my
right knee and my left Achilles tendon.
Because of the way we were each
pacing ourselves, I finished my third lap around the same time Justin finished
his fourth lap. Now we were both
starting a walking break at the same time.
We each had a target time of one hour from the start before we needed to
resume running.
When we resumed running, we
were halfway across a boardwalk that leads across a marsh. At first, I matched Justin’s running pace,
but it was too fast for me. As soon as
we got off the boardwalk and onto the gravel trail, I backed off and ran at my
own pace.
The course we were running on
went between two of the deep swimming holes in this park. On Tuesday and Wednesday, we were running on
a different course that went by these same two swimming holes. On those days, I consistently noticed cold
drafts on this part of the course. That’s
the result of wind blowing over the icy cold water. I was hoping we would get those same cold
drafts today, but they weren’t there this morning.
In the first half of the race, my
pace felt pretty easy, but I was worried I might have to slow down in the
second half of the race, as it got hotter.
I had been counting on those cold draft to keep me cool.
When I finished my sixth lap, I
was expecting Justin to be finishing his eighth lap. I didn’t see him yet, so a made a bathroom
stop. When I emerged from the
port-o-potty, I still didn’t see Justin, so I started walking.
After walking for about a
minute, I saw Justin running from the other direction. He said he lost a lot of time in that
lap. I knew I would finish my walking
break before he could catch up with me.
Justin runs much faster than I
do, so I assumed he would pass me within a few minutes. He didn’t.
I kept running and got all the way to the turnaround without seeing
him. After I made the turn, I saw Justin. I didn’t seem to be running as fast as
before. It looked more like he was
running at my pace. I suspect he slowed
down, so he could catch up to me at the end of the lap. That’s what happened.
At I finished that lap, I was
half done with the race. I had seven
laps left. Justin was two laps ahead of
me, so he just had five laps to go.
We started our walking breaks
together. Justin said he was going to
run the next two laps with me and then go back to running on his own.
I was scheduled to walk until
my watch read 2:20. Justin was no longer
on his original schedule, but we both took the same walking break. Then we resumed running. I’m sure Justin slowed down, but it was still
a little fast for me. I had to work a
little harder to keep up with him during that lap. At times, I felt my left Achilles tendon
tightening up a little.
When we finished the lap and
got back to the aid station, I was covered with sweat. Running faster in that lap was causing me to
overheat. The good news is that we
finished the lap so quickly that we could now walk for five and a half minutes.
Before we left the aid station,
I drank more Gatorade than usual. Then
we had a nice long walking break. The
walking break was long enough that I was able to cool down again.
As we resumed running again,
Justin slowed down for me. It was much
easier to keep up in that lap. Now that
we weren’t going as fast, I no longer noticed any discomfort in my Achilles
tendon.
Now, we started noticing cold
drafts near the swimming holes. They
weren’t there in the morning, but they were there when we needed them. It felt really refreshing whenever we went by
that part of the course. It also started
to get cloudy. It was in the 70s now,
but the occasional cold draft and the cloud cover did a lot to make the heat
more manageable.
When we finished that lap,
Justin said he would do one more with me and then do the last two on his
own. He ended up doing those two laps
with me as well. In all, we ran five
laps together. We were having a nice
conversation, and running together made the laps pass more easily for both of
us.
Running with me slowed him
down, but Justin still finished in less than four hours. After that, I still had two laps to go.
As I started my 13th lap, Tim
caught up to me. He mentioned that he
was hoping to break five hours. Tim was
one lap behind me, and I was on pace to break 4:40. If Tim ran with me on my last two laps, it
would keep him on pace to break five hours.
Instead of doing my usual
walking break, I started running with Tim.
Tim’s pace was about the same pace I would’ve run by myself. After we finished that lap, I persuaded Tim
to join me in a walking break as we started the next lap.
After our walking break, I ran
with Tim for the rest of that lap. That
was my last lap, but Tim still had one lap to go. I finished in 4:37:13. Tim had almost 23 minutes to run his last
lap. After doing two laps in 20 minutes
each, we were both pretty confident he could do that. I wasn’t there when Tim finished, but I later
saw in the results that he finished in 4:56.
I ran the entire second half of
my race with Justin and Tim. I can’t
remember another day when the second half of the race seemed to fly by so
quickly.
I’ve been running marathons
every day for two weeks now. I just have
six days to go. That’s the number of
races I originally signed up for, when I was just going to do the Summer Camp
Series.
Race Statistics
Distance: 26.2 miles
Time: 4:37:13
Average Pace: 10:34
Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:
419
Minnesota Marathons/Ultras:
72
Series Statistics
Races Completed: 14
Under Five Hours: 14
Average Time: 4:41:58
Wins: 9
No comments:
Post a Comment