Race Report: 2024 City of Oaks Marathon

On November 3, I ran the City of Oaks Marathon in Raleigh, NC.  This race has easy logistics.  If you stay in a downtown hotel, you can walk to the start and walk back from the finish.

When I ran this same race two years ago, it took me more than four and a half hours to finish.  There were several reasons for that.  First, I had a cold.  Second, I wasn’t in peak shape.  Even on a good day, I wasn’t fast enough to break four hours.  Finally, it was a warm day, and I was feeling the humidity from the first mile.

This year I had every reason to expect to be faster.  I’m healthy, I’m in better shape, and the weather was cooler.

I ran Boston qualifying times in my last four races, but they were all on courses that were mostly flat.  This race has lots of hills.  Running a qualifying time on this course would be more challenging.

I flew to Raleigh on Saturday.  On my way into town, I stopped at the LeRoy Martin Magnet Middle School to pick up my race packet.  Each year, there’s some type of gift at the expo.  This year, it was a pair of socks.

After packet pickup, I continued to my hotel in downtown Raleigh.  Then I spent most of the afternoon walking around the downtown area.  I’ve been to Raleigh twice before, so I wanted to do some different sightseeing.  This time, I followed a walking route I found online that connects several buildings that have murals.

This mural is called “All Are Welcome.”  It was hard to get an unobstructed view of this one, because there was a car parked right in front of it.  As a bonus, I saw another mural on the same building.

This mural, outside Shaw University, celebrates their 150th anniversary.

This one depicts Ann and Allen Iverson.

This mural is called “No Damsel.”  This isn't the whole thing, but I couldn't get it all in one picture.

This mural on the side of the Lincoln Theater is called “Honest Abe.”

This one is called “Abstraction Motion.”  It incorporates Google Fiber, so you can both see and feel it.

This mural of John Prine was painted during the 2018 World of Bluegrass International Festival.

This mural is called “Color Pop Corner.”

There’s artwork on the back of the convention center that’s lit up at night, but it’s nothing special during the day, so I didn’t take a picture.  I did, however, take a picture of the statue next to the front of the building.

There was one mural on the tour that was missing.  It used to be on a building that’s now part of a reconstruction project.  While I never got to see that one, I saw several other murals that weren’t part of the tour.  I also saw other forms of artwork.

I didn’t have any lunch, so I had an early dinner.  I went to Raleigh Beer Garden, which was just around the block from my hotel.  Their menu includes pizza, and they have more than 300 beers on tap.

This was the weekend that we set the clocks back.  Before going to bed, I checked to make sure the alarm clock in my room was set up to change automatically.  I also manually changed the clock on the microwave, so I wouldn’t be confused if I happened to notice it when I got up during the night.

When I got up on Sunday, the temperature was in the upper 40s, but it looked like it might get up to 50 by the time the race started.  That’s my usual threshold for wearing shorts.

In my last four races, I wore tights, and at times I felt too warm.  This time, I was going to wear shorts.  Thirty minutes before the race, I checked the weather.  It was still only 46 degrees, so I made a last-minute decision to wear tights.  It was the usual trade-off between being cold in the first half of the race or possibly getting hot in the second half.

They had a gear check, but I didn’t need to use it.  The starting line was just a few blocks from my hotel, so I didn’t go outside until 20 minutes before the race.

I didn’t know if there would be pace groups until I reached the start corrals.  They had pace groups, but their target times were all multiples of 15 minutes.  My goal was 3:50, and I expected that to be challenging on this course.  On a flat course, I might have started with the 3:45 group.  Instead, I lined up about 10 feet behind them and started at my own pace.

When I was walking around downtown Raleigh on Saturday, I couldn’t help but notice that every block was either uphill or downhill.  None of the hills was steep, but there weren’t any streets that were flat.  That made it difficult to know how fast I was starting.

The first few blocks were slightly uphill.  It seemed like I was starting at a slower pace than I usually do, but I was breathing harder than usual.

After a few blocks, we turned a corner and started running downhill.  Suddenly, running was easier.  I sped up, but I wasn’t working as hard.

During those first few blocks, the 3:45 pace group got so far ahead of me that I lost sight of them.  By the end of the first mile, I could see them again.  They were about half a block ahead of me.

To finish in 3:50, I needed to average 8:46 per mile.  I was surprised to see that I ran the first mile in 8:10.  The 3:45 group was evidently starting kind of fast.  Their target pace was 8:35, but they started even faster than I did.

The second mile was mostly downhill.  I still found it hard to gauge how fast I was running, because I couldn’t really go by perceived exertion.  Instead, I just kept up with the people around me, even though I had reason to believe it would be too fast.  My second mile was a little faster than my first mile.  As a result, I was now getting closer to the 3:45 group.

Early in the third mile, we turned a corner and started going up a hill.  I was careful not to work too hard on the hill.  I gradually dropped back from the 3:45 group.  Then I reached an aid station, and I briefly slowed to a walk while I drank some Gatorade.  That caused me to fall farther behind the 3:45 group.

The more I drifted back from the 3:45 group, the more it felt reasonable to keep up with the people around me.  That gave me more confidence that I would stay on a consistent pace.

There were lots of turns in the early miles.  Depending on which direction I was running, I sometimes felt a cold breeze.  It wasn’t windy enough to feel tiring, but it made me glad that I wore tights.  For the time being, I wasn’t in any danger of getting hot, but without the tights, I probably would’ve been cold.

After a couple fast miles, it seemed like the 3:45 group settled into the right pace.  I was running pretty close to their target pace, and I was always about a block behind them.  Then we reached a long downhill section, and I inadvertently caught up to them.

It was a large pace group, and they were spread out across the road.  I was running right behind them, but I was careful not to let myself get ahead of them.

The next time we reached an uphill section, I gradually drifted back from the 3:45 group.  Then we reached a downhill section that was steeper, and I accidentally got ahead of the group.  I eased up as much as I could without actually resisting the hill, but I was still in front of the group.  When the road turned uphill again, I fell behind them for good.  For most of the race, I could see them in the distance, but I never caught up to them again.

Around seven miles, we turned a corner and merged in with runners who were doing the 10K race.  I’m not sure how many miles those runners had run by now, but their pace was definitely slower.  There were lines of slow runners that I needed to pass.

I could no longer be confident that I could stay on pace just by keeping up with the runners behind me.  I had to pay attention to keeping up with the faster runners, while moving around the slower ones.  We were going up a hill at this point, so I had to pick up my effort to keep up with the faster runners.  Going up that hill, I got warm enough that I finally took off my gloves.

At the top of the hill, the 10K runners had a turnaround.  Those of us doing the marathon or half marathon kept going straight.  Now, I was once again surrounded by runners who were all going at the same pace.

I was relieved to be done with that hill.  I was also relieved that there were no longer any slower runners on the course.  At the same time, I also knew that I was nearing the end of the easy part of the course.  In another mile, we would leave the streets to begin a long out-and-back section on the Reedy Creek Trail, which is a paved bike path.  On roads, there were hills, but they were all fairly gradual.  The hills on the trail are sometimes steeper, and the abrupt changes in slope make it harder to stay in a consistent rhythm.  So far, I was running faster than my goal pace, but I expected that to be more difficult on the trail.

I wasn’t running with a pace group, but I wanted to be able to compare my pace to other runners.  Before we reached the trail, I was hoping to pick out one or two runners who seemed like they were running a consistent pace.  My plan was to follow them through the various undulations along the trail.

There had been different runners around me at different times, but as I looked around, I spotted one runner who always seemed to be about 20 feet in front of me.  It was a woman in a pink top and white shorts.  I didn’t know, however, if she was doing the marathon or the half marathon.  I wouldn’t have to wait much longer to find out.

Shortly after the eight mile mark, we reached the point were the marathon and half marathon routes diverged.  The woman in the pink top was doing the half marathon.  Those of us doing the marathon left the roads and entered the Reedy Creek Trail.

I took note of which runners were immediately in front of me.  One was a guy wearing a red shirt and a camelback.  Another was wearing a blue shirt and a white hat.  I kept up with these two guys over the next few ups and downs.  Then I inadvertently got ahead of them.  What’s surprising is that I passed them going up a hill.  When we reached a long downhill section, I sped away from them.

I remembered how much the hills on this trail took me out of my rhythm when I ran this race two years ago.  I didn’t remember that there was a downhill trend on the way out.

Over the next two miles, it seemed like we were mostly running downhill.  That scared me, because I would eventually have to run it in the uphill direction.

Mile 10 was mostly downhill, and I ran it in 7:56.  That was my fastest mile of the race.  I was back to being only about 30 seconds behind the 3:45 group.

Mile 11 was also mostly downhill.  That was my second fastest mile of the race.  I was getting closer to the 3:45 group, although it would take an effort to catch up to them.

I wasn’t trying to catch up to the group, but I wanted to keep them within sight.  Behind the group, there was a big gap.  My choices were to either stay close to the group or resign myself to running completely by myself.  As long as I could see the group, I could tell if I was maintaining a similar pace.

At one point, we went under a bridge, turned a sharp corner, and them climbed a ramp up to street level.  Then we crossed the same bridge that we had just gone under.

Going under the bridge, I was as close as I would get to the 3:45 group.  Going up the ramp, I was careful to conserve energy.  I slowed down, and as a result, I fell farther behind the group.

After crossing the bridge, we turned back onto the trail and went deep into the forest again.

Most of the time that we were on the Reedy Creek Trail, we were surrounded by trees.  We were sheltered from the sun, but not from the wind.  There was a constant breeze, and it felt surprisingly cold.  With each mile, my hands felt colder, until they felt like ice.  I told myself to enjoy it while it lasted.  I still expected to get hot later in the race.

For a long time, I was running by myself, but then I was passed by a runner wearing an orange shirt.  I wanted to run with him, but his pace seemed too fast.  It occurred to me that he was going to catch up to the 3:45 group.  If I could keep up with him, he would pull me up to the group.

I stayed with him for a while, but then we reached a steep hill.  The hill was short, but it forced me to slow down.  That was as close as I would get to catching up with the 3:45 group.

That hill took us up to a street, and for the next several blocks, we were running on a concrete sidewalk.  I was worried about tripping on an uneven seam between two sections of sidewalk, so I ran more cautiously here.  That caused me to slow down.

The halfway point was on this concrete section.  When I got there, I was on pace for 3:42.  I was three minutes ahead of my goal pace.  The 3:45 group got there at least 30 seconds ahead of me, so they were still going fast.

I knew that I would have more uphill running in the second half of the race, so I expected to slow down.  I was optimistic that I could run a Boston qualifying time, but I definitely wasn’t going to try for negative splits.

The section on concrete sidewalk was initially uphill, but them it turned downhill.  Even going downhill, I had to take it at a cautious pace.  At the end of that section, we reached an aid station.  Then we crossed the street and backtracked a short distance to where we could get back onto the trail.

As I grabbed a cup of Gatorade at the aid station, a drop of Gatorade flew into my left eye.  I had forgotten how much that stings.  I briefly had difficulty keeping that eye open.

Now that I was back on the trail, I was able to pick up my pace.  It was getting more tiring though.  I usually find it easier to push myself when I’m in the second half of a race.  This race was an exception.  I was still almost three miles from the turnaround.  As long as I was still heading out, I didn’t feel like I was in the second half of the race.  For now, I could only think about how far it still was to the turnaround.

By now, I was starting to see faster runners who were already on their way back.  Now that we had two-way traffic on the trail, we had to keep to the right to make room for the runners who were going the other direction.  We could no longer run the tangents going around the turns.

I started to encounter more and more things that took me out of my rhythm.  Sometimes it was a hill.  Sometimes it was a sharp turn.  Sometimes it was a wooden bridge.  At one point, it was all three at once.  We were on a wooden pedestrian bridge that went underneath a larger bridge.  There were sharp turns and some rapid ups and downs as we went under the bridge.  I slowed down so much here that five runners passed me in rapid succession.

After that, we went up the steepest hill in the race.  I wondered if I would need to walk it.  When I saw the runners ahead of me walking it, I followed suit.

At the top of the hill, we came to a clearing.  This was one of the few places along the Reedy Creek Trail where spectators could easy watch the race.  I recognized this as the spot where some friends were watching for me two years ago.

Next, we ran past a small lake.  Then we went deep into the forest again.

I was now within a mile of the turnaround.  As I got closer, I saw a pace group coming back from the turnaround.  I was surprised to see it was the 3:45 group.  I thought I was still half a mile from the turnaround, but it was actually just ahead of me.

Coming back from the turn, I started to run with more confidence.  I spotted the runner with the red short and the camelback.  I had passed him several miles earlier.  Then he passed me in one of my slower miles.  Now I was on the verge of catching him again.  He was going faster than most of the other runners around us, so I followed him.

Although I wasn’t keeping up with the 3:45 group, I was usually running a similar pace.  In miles 14 through 16, my average pace was 8:46, but before that, my pace was usually in the 8:30s.  It’s worth noting that 8:46 was my goal pace.  Those miles felt slow, but only by comparison with all the faster miles.

In mile 17, I sped up to 8:32, while chasing the guy in the red shirt.  He was setting a good pace for me.

Toward the end of that mile, I ran down the same steep hill where I had to walk going uphill.  It was so steep that running it in the downhill direction was uncomfortable.  I felt one of my insoles slip forward in my shoe.

Right after that, we reached the wooden bridge with hills and turns.  I took it faster in this direction, but I tripped on something just before the bridge.  I didn’t fall, but it scared me.  After that, I accelerated, and I passed the guy in the red shirt.  Mile 18 was another 8:32 mile.

I was pleased with my pace in those two miles, but I still had five more miles on the trail, and they were going to have an uphill trend.  In the next mile, I reached a hill that was long enough that I had to walk the steepest part of it.  That mile was slower.

I was discouraged at first to have slowed to 8:58 in mile 19.  That was my slowest mile so far.  Then it occurred to me that it was only 12 seconds slower than my goal pace.  I wasn’t keeping track, but I knew had to be at least three and a half minutes ahead of schedule going into that mile.  I could easily afford to give back 12 seconds.

In mile 20, I picked up the pace again.  I gained back seven seconds of the 12 that I had lost in the previous mile.  I knew the next three miles would be slow, but I had a large cushion.  I was confident that I could maintain a steady pace when I got back onto city streets.  My concern was losing time on the hills in the last three miles of the trail.

Mile 21 had another hill that forced me to walk.  I was disciplined and only walked for 30 seconds.  I gave back 37 seconds in that mile.  Mile 22 also had a hill that forced me to do some walking.  In that mile, I gave back 19 seconds.

I was giving back time, but I was limiting the damage.  I estimated that I still had a cushion of at least two and a half minutes.

Mile 23 was the toughest.  There was a hill that was so long that I couldn’t see the whole thing at once.  I walked the steepest part of the hill.  Then I resumed running to what I thought was the top of the hill.  I turned a corner and saw that I wasn’t even halfway to the top.  I had to take another walking break.

That wasn’t the last hill in that mile, but it was the last one that forced me to walk.  When I crested the hill, I accelerated.  I started passing most of the other runners, but there was one runner who kept up with me going downhill.  She passed me, but I kept pace with her.

At the end of that mile, I was running strong, but overall, that mile was slow.  It was by far my slowest mile of the race.  In just one mile, I gave back more than a minute of my cushion.

I was thinking we would leave the trail before the 23 mile mark, but I was wrong.  We still had about half a mile on the trail.  Fortunately, this section was mostly downhill.  Then we finally came out onto the streets again.

I knew the rest of the race would have a downhill trend, but the first few blocks were slightly uphill.  I fought my way uphill without losing much time.  When I finished mile 24, I saw that I had gained back more than 20 seconds.

I had been trying to keep up with the woman who passed me in mile 23, but she was too fast.  Then she stopped briefly at an aid station.  I passed her at the aid station and accelerated as I began a long downhill section.  I ran that section as fast as I could, but she was a strong closer.  She eventually passed me gain, and I couldn’t keep up with her, even though I sped up to 8:10 in that mile.

Coming back into the downtown area, we had a strong headwind.  Up until now, the wind was always my friend.  It kept me from getting hot.  Now, the wind was tiring.

With 1.2 miles to go, I knew I would break 3:50 by a comfortable margin, but I could see another hill ahead of me.

Another fast runner passed me.  I wanted to try to keep up with him, but I had to conserve energy for the hill.

That was the last hill of any significance.  After the hill, it was almost all downhill to the finish.  At first, I wasn’t recognizing any of the buildings or street names.  Then I ran past a fast food restaurant that I had walked by on Saturday.  I had a better feel for where I was.

As I approached what I thought was the final turn, I saw a runner who had already finished and was walking back to his hotel.  He said, “Get around the corner, and it’s downhill to the finish.”

I rounded the corner, but I still couldn’t see the finish.  On the plus side, it was noticeably downhill.

I raced down the hill, and I reached the “26” sign.  I ran that mile in 8:12.  I was crushing it, but I still couldn’t see the finish line.  There were still two more turns.

I made the first of those turns, and I immediately saw the second one.  It was just one short block.  It was slightly uphill, but my momentum carried me to the last turn.  Then I could see the finish line, and the final approach was downhill.

This was my first race using a watch that I’ve only had for 10 days.  It’s similar to my old watch, but saving the data from a run is more complicated.  There are two extra steps.  I have to rate how hard I ran and how I felt.  I was so preoccupied with saving my data, that I never looked at my time.  I knew I beat my goal by at least a few minutes, but I walked away from the finish line not knowing my time.

I love the design of the finisher medal.  It features a large acorn that spins.  There are also acorns and oak leaves on the ribbon.

There were volunteers handing one water bottles, but I didn’t take one.  My hotel was less than two blocks away, and I had plenty of water there.  I did, however, make a point of getting some post-race food.

A volunteer at the food tent handed me a banana and a bag with other snacks.  At another table, they had cookies and skewers with cold cuts.  I took a cookie, but I passed on the cold cuts.

When I got back to my hotel room, there were several things I wanted to do first.  I wanted to download the data from my watch.  I wanted to look up my official result.  I wanted to eat my snacks.  I wanted to use the bathroom.  I wanted to get out of my sweaty clothes and take a bath.  More important than all of those was getting out of my sweaty shoes and socks.  I could not do that fast enough.

Shortly after downloading the data from my watch, I noticed I had an email with my official result.  I finished in 3:45:50, which was good for third place in my age group.  I qualified for Boston by more than four minutes, and I did it on a hilly course.  I had BQs in my previous four races, but those were all on relatively flat courses.

I never regretted wearing tights.  Later in the race, it was getting warmer, but I seemed to get a cold breeze whenever I needed one.

In case anyone is wondering, the hotel I stayed at is the Hampton Inn.  If you’re planning to do this race, you should be aware that this hotel has pros and cons.  On the plus side, you can’t beat the location for race day logistics.  It’s about half a block from the back of the start corrals and only three blocks from the starting line.  It’s also only about a block and a half from the finish area.

The big negative of this hotel is also the location.  It’s in a nightlife district, and there’s a place next to the hotel that plays loud music until at least 2 AM.  I was fortunate.  I had a room on the side of the hotel that’s farthest from the noise.  I occasionally heard a loud truck or motorcycle, but I didn’t hear the music.  I talked to runners with rooms on the other side of the building, and they were kept awake by the noise.  To their credit, the hotel staff provides earplugs to all their guests.

Race statistics:

Distance:  26.2 miles

Time:  3:45:50

Average Pace:  8:37 per mile

First Half:  1:50:59

Second Half:  1:54:51

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  532

Boston Qualifiers:  173

Place in Age Group:  3rd

Race Report: 2024 Atlantic City Marathon

On October 20, I ran the Atlantic City Marathon.  I needed a New Jersey Marathon for my fifth circuit of marathons in every state.  This was the only one I could fit into my schedule.  It wasn’t an ideal fit, as it meant running marathons on five consecutive weekends.  After pushing to my limit in my previous four races, I wasn’t sure how fast I would run this one.

Friday night, I went to bed feeling fine.  I woke up during the night with discomfort on the left side of my lower back.  I was able to get back to sleep, but in the morning, I found that I sometimes had sudden pains on that side just standing still.

I didn’t have time to do much about it.  I had an early flight, so I had to get ready quickly, so I could get to the airport.

My back didn’t bother me during the flight, but I started to notice it after getting off the plane.  It got worse while I was standing in line waiting for my rental car.

I flew to Philadelphia Saturday morning and drove from there.  I rented my car from Dollar.  I did their online check-in, which was supposed to allow me to skip the counter and go straight to my car.  After answering all the questions, I got a screen telling me they were sold out of economy cars.

I went inside to the counter, and I saw about 20 people already in line.  They all did the online check-in too, but they were waiting for cars to become available.  I was there for about an hour before I finally got my car.  There’s no excuse for that.  The whole purpose of a reservation system is to manage inventory.  I’d rather be told they don’t have enough cars when I’m trying to make a reservation.  I’ve had good experiences with Dollar at other airports, but this is the last time I’ll ever rent from them in Philadelphia.

The headquarters hotel for the race was Bally’s Atlantic City Resort & Casino, but I stayed at The Claridge Hotel, which is in the adjacent block.  The Claridge is connected to Bally’s by a skyway, so staying there was just as convenient as staying at Bally’s.

The drive to Atlantic City took about an hour.  I was originally planning to do some sightseeing, but I went straight to the hotel instead.  That’s when I thought my luck might be improving.  The advertised check-in time was 4:00, but I was able to get into a room as soon as I arrived.  That gave me time to do a workout before going over to Bally’s to pick up my race packet.  I noticed my back while doing my exercises, but no more than when I was just standing or walking.

After my workout, I turned on my GPS watch, just to make sure it was charged.  It’s a good thing I did.  It was completely dead.  I tried to charge it, but it didn’t seem to be taking a charge.  For the race, I needed to use my Timex.  I normally use that watch just to know the time of day, but it also has a stopwatch.  For the second straight week, I was going “old school.”  If I wanted to know my pace, I would just read my time at each mile marker.  Alternatively, I could run with a pace group.

When I was growing up, my friends and I used to play Monopoly.  The names of the properties in that game are based on the streets and railroads of Atlantic city in the 1930s.  Most of those streets can still be found in Atlantic City today.  I was initially planning to drive around and find them all.  I decided to settle for just taking pictures of Boardwalk and Park Place.  That was easy.  My hotel was next to Park Place, and about a block from the boardwalk.

Packet pickup was at Bally’s.  I didn’t see any signage in the lobby, so I asked the bellman.  Once I got up to the right floor, I saw signage leading the rest of the way.  As it turns out, there were signs in the lobby.  I just came form the wrong direction to see them.

Bringing my race packet back to my room took longer than it should have.  The Claridge has 23 floors.  There are five elevators, but two of them were out of service.  There were several large groups staying at the hotel, including two wedding parties, so there were always dozens of people waiting for elevators.  I had to wait more than 20 minutes before I could get an elevator.  If I was on a low floor, I would’ve taken the stairs, but my room was on the 17th floor.

I had some time before dinner, so I went to Tennessee Avenue Beer Hall to have a pre-dinner beer flight, since they have 40 different beers on tap.  I ended up staying there for dinner.

Before going to bed, I took some Tylenol.  That allowed me to sleep comfortably for about half the night.  By 2:00 AM, however, the Tylenol wore off.  After that, the pain came back.  I felt it when I got up to go to the bathroom.  I also felt it when I rolled over in bed.  Most likely, I strained a muscle in my lower back.

After 3:30, I couldn’t get back to sleep.  I rested in bed for the next two hours.  Then, I finally got up and started getting ready for the race.

When I ran this race two years ago, it was rainy, and we had a strong headwind in the second half of the race.  This year, the weather was much nicer.  It was a sunny day, and there wasn’t much wind.

When I got up, the temperature was 42 degrees.  I was expecting it to be warmer than that.  I took a look at the hourly forecast and saw that it wasn’t as warm as the last forecast I saw on Saturday.  I was planning to wear shorts, but I made a last-minute decision to wear tights instead.

When I was ready to go, I decided to take the stairs, rather than risk an unpredictable wait for an elevator.  I only had to go down to the 2nd floor.  From there, I could take the skyway over to Bally’s.

The race organizers provided a gear check, but I didn’t need to use it.  The starting line was right outside of Bally’s, so I could wait until 15 minutes before the race before going outside.

When I went out onto the boardwalk, I was more comfortable than I thought I would be.  For the second straight week, I misjudged the weather.  I would have been OK in shorts.  Now I had to wonder if I would get too hot in the tights.

The race started on the boardwalk, but we only ran for about three blocks before turning onto Martin Luther King Boulevard.  I was hoping to run with the 3:50 pace group, but I had to go at my own pace until we got off the boardwalk.  On the boardwalk, I had to pay close attention to my footing.

The leader of the 3:50 pace group warned us that he would probably start a little fast.  As we turned to leave the boardwalk, we ran down a short ramp before getting onto the street.  He and the rest of the group accelerated.  I waited until I was off the wooden ramp before trying to catch up to them.  Then I had to work hard to catch up.

As we got onto the pavement, I started to pay attention to how my lower back felt.  Running wasn’t causing any additional discomfort.  If anything, it was helping.  As I got warmed up, my back seemed to feel better.

The first mile was about 15 seconds faster than our target pace.  That wasn’t a surprise.  It’s what our pace leader told us to expect.

Over the next several miles, we looped through the Venice Park neighborhood.  We ran over a few bridges and through a tunnel.  Those were the only real hills in the race.  The rest of the course was pretty flat.

At one point, another runner noticed my Comrades Marathon shirt and asked me about it.  As I was talking to him, I missed an aid station.  I was overdressed for the conditions, so it was inevitable that I would get hot later in the race.  I couldn’t afford to skip any other aid stations.

I realized I was getting to far ahead of the group when I found myself right behind the 3:45 group.  Then I had to slow down.

I fell back to the 3:50 group, but after a few more miles, I found the pace to be tiring.  I wasn’t sure if I could keep up that pace for the whole race, but I wanted to stay with the group until we reached the boardwalk.  After that, I might have to slow down.

In the middle of the eighth mile, we reached the beginning of the boardwalk.  At first, we were on a section that runs from north to south.  Then we turned a corner.  The rest of the boardwalk ran from east to west.

I’ve run on some boardwalks that were springy.  This one was fairly firm, which helped.  The boards were at an angle to the direction we were running, which minimized the risk of tripping on the gaps between boards.  What made the boardwalk somewhat hazardous were the screws holding the boards in place.  Most of them were flush with the wood, but sometimes a whole row of screws would be stick up about an eighth of an inch.

The lines of screws weren’t uniform.  Sometimes they would be as much as two feet apart.  More often, they would be only about a foot apart, which made it difficult to run between them.  I had to focus all my attention on watching where the screws were, so I wouldn’t catch a shoe on one.

Shortly after we got onto the boardwalk, I saw a section on the right that seemed safer.  I was able to pick up my pace there, and I got a little ahead of the group.  After that, I managed to stay ahead of the group for the entire length of the boardwalk.  I knew they were right behind me, because I could hear them.

The boardwalk was five miles long, and maintaining my focus for that long was mentally draining.  After one mile, I was already getting tired.  It was also more tiring physically.  I altered my stride so I could pick up my feet more than I usually do.  I tried to pretend I was running on a trail.  That was something our pace leader suggested before the race.

About halfway down the boardwalk, I got far enough ahead of the group that I could no longer hear them talking.  I rarely took my eyes off the boards, but at one point I glanced ahead and saw that I was getting close to the 3:45 group.

By the end of the boardwalk, I could hear the 3:50 group talking again.  As I was about to turn to leave the boardwalk, I heard the pace leader say, “right turn ahead.”

We ran inland for one block and then turned onto Atlantic Avenue.  We would follow Atlantic Avenue west for three more miles before turning around.

As I turned onto Atlantic Avenue, the group caught up to me again.  I was pleased to have made it through the longest section on the boardwalk without falling behind.  I paid a price, though.  That section was really tiring.  I still had to work hard to keep up with the group.

At the halfway point, we were about a minute ahead of schedule.  We would eventually have to come back to the boardwalk again.  We would be on it for the last three miles of the race.  I wanted to have a little bit of a cushion when we got there, so I would have the option of slowing down in those last three miles.

At about 16 miles, we reached The Point.  This was the westernmost point on the course.  We made a small loop and then doubled back on Atlantic Avenue.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but we had a slight headwind before the turn.  After the turn, it was a light tailwind.  Now that I no longer felt the wind, I started getting hot.

We ran east along Atlantic Avenue for about a mile and then turned to begin a loop through a neighborhood in Margate City.  In miles 17 and 18, I was finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the group, which had gradually thinned out to just three runners.  The other guy who was still keeping up with the pacer said that his watch was showing a current pace of 8:10.  Our pace leader acknowledged that we had sped up, and he slowed us down again.  After that, it was much easier to keep up.

I took more of an initiative in leading the conversation.  As I did, I may have inadvertently sped up.  Soon, our pace leader said we were speeding up again, and we needed to slow down.

The loop through Margrate City was about four miles.  When we got back onto Atlantic Avenue, we had less than five miles to go.  I was hot, but I was hanging on.

We retraced our route back to the boardwalk.  Then we had just over three miles to go.  I didn’t know if I would need to slow down on this section, so I asked our pace leader how much of a cushion we had.  He said we were about 30 seconds ahead of schedule.  Over the last three miles, I could afford to slow down by about 10 seconds per mile, if necessary.

I had to stop paying attention to the guys I was running with and focus 100 percent of my attention on watching my footing.  I felt like I was slowing down, but I was staying ahead of the others.

The only things that might trip me up were those screws.  When we were on the boardwalk earlier, I was watching them constantly, but on three separate occasions I felt one of my shoes momentarily catching on one.  This time, I saw a few screws that stuck out by more than a quarter inch.

At times, I caught myself starting to take a longer stride.  When I did, I immediately switched back to a short stride, so I could pick my feet up.  I was getting fatigued, but I couldn’t afford to get careless.

Even though I felt like I was slowing down, I was actually getting farther ahead of the pace group.  As I started leaving them behind, there was only one other guy who was still with the pace leader.

I didn’t know my current pace, but I assumed I was OK as long as I stayed ahead of them.  Then I started to wonder what would happen if the other guy couldn’t keep up with the pacer.  What would the pacer do?  Would he maintain a consistent pace, even though nobody was still with him.  Would he stay with the guy who was slowing down to help him finish?

That last thought made me realize I needed to pay attention to my own pace.  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the “24” banner, so I glanced at my watch.  My time at 24 was 3:29:xx.  I didn’t look at my watch long enough to see how many seconds.  I was too afraid to take my eyes off the boardwalk for more than a split second.

I had at least 20 minutes to run the last 2.2 miles.  Even if I slowed down to nine minutes per mile, that would be fast enough.

I maintained my same effort for another mile.  I encountered a few spots where the boards were a little bouncy, but I stayed on pace.

At 25 miles, I made a point of noticing my exact time.  It was 3:38:25.  I was easily still on pace to break 3:50.

Just then, I reached a section of the boardwalk where the boards were all in good condition and none of the screws were sticking up.  That gave me the confidence to speed up.  I ran faster all the way to the finish.

While the boardwalk was mostly wood, there were spots where it crossed a sidewalk leading to a pier.  Then there would be five to ten feet of concrete.  I used those brief concrete sections as opportunities to look ahead.  Ahead of me, I could see one of the Bally’s towers.

When I was running on the boards, I didn’t dare look ahead, even briefly.  At 26 miles, I knew the finish line was just ahead of me, but I couldn’t look for it yet.  I had to get much closer. 

When I could actually see the finish line, I accelerated.  Before crossing the line, I had to remind myself that I was wearing a different watch.  I had to think about where the Stop button was.  I finished in 3:49:07.  It was my fourth consecutive Boston qualifier.  After getting my medal, I waited for the others.  They both came in under 3:50.

The finisher medal has a cool design.  The anchor swings from side to side.

As I left the finisher chute, I started looking for two things: the beer tent and a results tent.  I found the beer tent, but I didn’t see any place where I could look up my result.  The fact that I didn’t have any Garmin data made me somewhat paranoid until I saw my official result.

While I was drinking my beer, I was spotted by two other Marathon Maniacs, and we took an impromptu post-race picture.  When I asked one of them if he had seen a results tent, he offered to look up my result on his phone.  When he entered my bib number, it showed my name, but no time.  That certainly wasn’t reassuring.

I walked back to the timing tent that was next to the finish line.  When I told them my result wasn’t showing up online, they said nobody’s result was online yet.  Then the finish line announcer made an announcement to that effect.

I went back to the hotel, where I had left my phone.  I had several text messages with my times at the various chip mats.  One had my time at the finish line.  Now I felt reassured.

I had been too preoccupied to think about my back, but I suddenly realized I had not noticed any discomfort since the first mile of the race.  I’ll have to wait and see if it bothers me later.  Pain has a way of melting away when you’re exerting yourself.  That doesn’t mean the pain is gone.  I was probably just suppressing it.  Still, it’s helpful to know that running didn’t make it worse.

I never bothered to look for post-race food before leaving the finish area.  I usually don’t eat a real meal until later in the day, but I was starving.  After taking a long hot shower and getting into clean clothes, I went over to Bally’s to have lunch in one of their restaurants.  I also rehydrated with a glass of water and two glasses of orange juice.

I just need one more state to finish my fifth circuit of marathons or ultras in every state.  I’ll finish next month in Oklahoma at the Route 66 Marathon.

Race statistics:

Distance:  26.2 miles

Time:  3:49:07

Average Pace:  8:44 per mile

First Half:  1:53:59

Second Half:  1:55:08

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  531

Boston Qualifiers:  172

New Jersey Marathon:  5

Race Report: 2024 Chicago Marathon

On October 13, I ran the Chicago Marathon.  This is the sixth time I’ve run this race.  I’m usually able to get into the race with a qualifying time.  Running this race is usually an excuse to travel to Chicago for the pizza.  Chicago-style pizza is my favorite.

Hotels in Chicago are expensive on race weekend.  The flight from Minneapolis to Chicago is relatively short, so I didn’t fly to Chicago until Saturday morning.

I took a train into the city from the airport, and arrived at my hotel around 9:30.  I stayed at the Palmer House, which is just a block away from Grant Park, where the race starts and finishes.  I’ve stayed at this hotel twice before.

It was too early to check into a room, so I left my bags at the hotel and went to the McCormick Place, where the expo was held.  After the expo, I had lunch at Giordano’s., which is one of the better restaurants for deep dish pizza.

After lunch, I went back to the hotel, and I was able to check into my room.  After bringing my bags up to my room, I did a workout in the fitness room.  Then I organized my clothes for the race.

When I travel, I sometimes look for styles of beer that I can’t find at home.  I learned that a local brewery had collaborated with a brewery in Kiev to produce a Ukrainian Golden Ale, which is a style of beer I had never tried before.  I had some free time before dinner, so I took a train to a bar/beer store on the north side that had this beer.

My friend Mary traveled to Chicago to volunteer at both the 5K race and the marathon.  I had dinner with Mary and three of her other friends who were either running or volunteering.

We went to Chicago Pizza & Oven Grinder Company.  I had never been to this restaurant before, but they have something called a pizza pot pie.  It’s like a deep-dish pizza, but it’s baked with the crust on top.  Then they flip it over and cut it out of the pan, so the crust is more like a bowl.

Sunday was race day.  I was conflicted about what to wear.  I was expecting temperatures in the 50s, but with strong winds.  Normally, when the temperature is above 50, I’ll wear shorts, but I didn’t know how cold it would feel with the wind.  Also, this is a race where you spend a long time in the start corrals before the race actually starts.  I was worried about my legs getting too cold while I was waiting in the corrals.

When I got up, it was 60 degrees.  That was warmer than I expected, but it looked like the temperature was still dropping.  I still expected the temperature to be in the 50s for the whole race.  I was still worried about cold winds, so I reluctantly wore tights.

The marathon was divided into three waves.  The first wave started at 7:30.  I was in the second wave, which didn’t start until 8:00.  The race organizers recommend arriving in Grant Park two hours before your wave starts.  I’ve learned to take that recommendation seriously.  There are security checkpoints to get into the start area, and they need to inspect everyone’s bags.  If you don’t allow enough time, you can get stuck in a long line.

I arrived at Grant Park at 6:00.  I got through the security checkpoint quickly, so I had lots of time before I needed to be in my corral.  I had a jacket, gloves, and a pair of wind pants, so I didn’t have to worry about getting cold while I waited.

The gear check tents were near Buckingham Fountain.  There are also benches around the fountain, so that’s where I was planning to wait.  When I got to the fountain, I didn’t see any port-o-potties.  I saw some portable changing rooms, but no port-o-potties.  I asked at one of the information tents, and a volunteer told me the nearest port-o-potties were on the other side of the street with the start corrals.

I found the port-o-potties.  There were near the corrals for people in the third wave.  When I got there, there wasn’t any line.  I did my business and then went back to the fountain, where I found a bench I could sit on.  I still had an hour and a half before I needed to be in my corral.

I relaxed by the fountain for about half an hour.  I needed to make another bathroom stop, but first I took off my wind pants and checked my gear bag.  I kept my jacket on.

I went back to the same port-o-potties.  It was harder to get to them now, because more of the street was blocked off.  There were lines, but they weren’t unreasonably long.

After my second bathroom stop, I still had 55 minutes before the start of my wave.  I expected to make one more bathroom stop before going to my corral.  I was tempted to immediately get back in line again, but I didn’t know how long it would take it get to my corral.  It was a long walk, and I would have to get through thick crowds.

There were more port-o-potties that were closer to my corral, so I went there instead.  That was a mistake.  The lines there were insane.  There was a separate line for each port-o-potty, and there were about 50 people in each line.  I waited in line until it was obvious that I didn’t have time.  Then I gave up and went to my corral.  By then, the first wave had started.

I was assigned to corral F, which was the first corral of the second wave.  When I got there, it looked like the corral was already packed.  There were dozens of runners trying to get in, but there was only one entrance, and the volunteers had to check each runner’s race bib.

There was hardly any room to get into the corral.  Some runners were getting into the corral and then stopping near the entrance.  One of the volunteers was telling us to keep moving after we got into the corral.  I didn’t see any room near the back of the corral, so I started moving forward.  The farther I moved forward, the more room I found.  The corral was only overcrowded near the back.

I ended up lining up farther forward than I probably should have.  Near me, I saw a 3:35 pace group.  Just a short distance in front of me, I saw pace groups for 3:20, 3:25, and 3:30.  There was also a 3:40 group, but they were lined up at the back of the corral.  I couldn’t get anywhere near them.

Fifteen minutes before my wave was due to start, they closed the entrances to the corrals, and started moving us forward into the area where the runners in wave one had previously lined up.  As we slowly walked forward, we had to step over clothing and water bottles that were discarded by the runners in wave one.

Five minutes before our start, we moved forward some more.  I took off my jacket and tied it around my waist.  It had been a long wait, but I knew it was about to get serious when I heard them play “Sirius.”  That’s the same music they played just before the first wave started.

I knew two of the runners who were leading the 3:45 group, but they were lined up in corral G.  My plan was to start running on my own and join the 3:45 group when they caught up to me.  Until then, I was planning to pace myself for about 3:50.  That works out to about 8:46 per mile.

This race gets larger every year.  This year, there were more than 50,000 runners.  In a race that large, the start is always congested.  I didn’t have a good feel for my pace.  I just moved my feet quickly and tried not to bump into anyone.  That forced me to start at the pace of the other runners in my corral, even though I had every reason to believe that would be too fast.

In the first mile, we crossed a bridge over the Chicago River.  It’s was one of those steel grate bridges that’s uncomfortable to run on.  There were a few bridges like this, and they put carpet over the bridges to make them more comfortable for running.  I saw another runner trip on the carpet.  He almost fell, but he managed to keep his balance.

Shortly after we made our first turn, I heard my watch vibrate.  It was already recording my split for the first mile, even though I was sure I had not run that far.  It said I ran the first mile in 6:38.  I knew that was wrong.  I’m not capable of running that fast.

When you’re surrounded by tall buildings, you don’t have a direct line of sight to the GPs satellites.  Instead, the signal can bounce off the sides of buildings.  That can really fool a GPS watch, so you see some weird results.  It was almost two more minutes before I reached the one-mile sign.

I checked my watch when I finished the first mile.  My actual time for that mile was 8:31.  That was too fast, but it wasn’t crazy fast.  I kept running and didn’t worry too much about it.  I could settle into a slower pace later.  For now, I was just trying to make it around the corners without bumping into people.

After the next turn, I reached an aid station.  In crowded races like this, I’m always worried about bumping into other runners at the aid stations.  I waited for other runners to move in and grab cups of Gatorade.  When it looked like there was nobody in the way, I angled toward one of the volunteers who was holding out a cup.  Just then, a much faster running darted between me and the volunteers.  He bumped my shoulder, pushing me away from the aid station.  I had to wait until that runner had taken his cup and moved past me.  Then I was finally able to grab a cup.

The aid station volunteers at this race all know what they’re doing.  They hold the cups out, sometimes at arm’s length.  They hold them delicately and let you grab them as you go by.  I was always able to grab a cup on the run and drink it without spilling.  Normally, I slow to a walk while drinking.  In this race, I drank on the run at every aid station.  I never walked a single step in the whole race.

The only problem at aid stations was the other runners.  More than once, a runner sped between me and the volunteers, just as I was going to grab a cup.  More than once, the runner in front of me suddenly stopped, forcing me to slow down or switch directions.  Thankfully, this became less of a problem later in the race.

Long before I finished the second mile, my watch was already recording a split.  I ignored the splits my watch was recording, because I didn’t trust them.  I went “old school.”  I read my watch each time I reached a mile marker.  I used to do that all the time.  The hard part is remembering your time at the previous mile marker, so you can subtract to get your current pace.  When I reached the second mile marker, I saw that my pace was only one second slower than the first mile.

By the third mile, I was already getting hot and sweaty.  There wasn’t as much wind as I expected, and I was noticing some humidity.  I was still running faster than I planned, and getting too hot was likely to make the pace feel more tiring.

I never saw the sign for three miles, but I saw the sign for 5K.  My time there was consistent with my time at two miles.

We were heading north now.  The last forecast I had seen showed the wind coming mostly from the north.  We should have had a headwind now, but I still wasn’t noticing much wind.  Either I was wrong about the wind direction or the wind wasn’t as strong as I was expecting.  Either way, I was regretting my decision to wear tights.  I was overdressed.

I also regretted that I wasn’t able to make another bathroom stop before the race.  I could feel some pressure building up in my intestines.  I was sure I would need to make a bathroom stop at some point, but I wanted to wait as long as possible.  I had two concerns.  My first concern was that stopping this early in the race might cause me to fall behind the 3:45 group that was somewhere behind me.  I don’t know how much stagger there was between corrals.  So far, I was running slightly faster than their pace.  If I stopped for two or three minutes, they might go by me.  I didn’t want to have to try to catch up to them if I fell behind.  My second concern is that stopping might take me out of my rhythm.  The runners around me were keeping me on a fast pace.  If I dropped back too far because I stopped, I might suddenly be surrounded by slower runners.

By the time I reached the five-mile mark, the sun came out.  I was expecting it to stay cloudy.  Now I was even more concerned that I would get too hot.  I hold up well when I’m hot, but it would make my pace feel more tiring.  I was still averaging about 8:32 per mile, and I questioned whether this pace would wear me down.

In mile six, I sped up a little.  For the first time, my pace was under 8:30.  Before, my pace just seemed too fast.  Now, it was starting to seem crazy fast.  Mile seven was also faster than 8:30.

The aid stations usually had music.  Somewhere around seven miles, I heard them playing “Maniac” from the movie Flashdance.  I don’t listen to music during races, but I’ve sometimes thought about creating a playlist where each song fits the emotions you’re feeling at a specific point in the race.  “Maniac” is a song that would definitely go in my playlist, but I wouldn’t listen to it this early in the race.  It’s an energetic song, and it might make me run too fast, which is exactly what I was doing.  It would be better for later in the race, when you’re fighting to hang on.

By now, mostly of the runners around me had settled into a similar pace, but I saw one guy weaving around people like mad as he tried to move up.  He came up on my left, and then suddenly cut in front of me.  As he did, one of his feet hooked my left leg.  I didn’t lose my balance, but he did.  He barely avoided falling.  Then he continued weaving around people.  He was adding all kinds of extra distance.  I sometimes get bottled up behind slower runners, but I try to be patient about finding an opening that makes it easy to get around them.

In the eighth mile, I saw a dump truck blocking the road ahead of us, so I knew we were about to turn.  We had reached the northernmost point on the course.  After turning the corner, I saw someone dressed as Superman, complete with cape.  Then I saw a runner next to him dressed as Captain America, complete with shield.  I wondered if they were friends and they were running together.  Then I wondered if they knew that their characters were from rival comic book companies.

We didn’t go very far before turning again.  Now we were heading south, back towards the downtown area.  I didn’t notice as much wind now.  If I was right about having a headwind before, we would have a tailwind on our way back.  I was still hot and sweaty, so I needed a cooling breeze.  I wasn’t going to get one for several miles.

I felt like I was going at a pace that might break me, especially if I was too hot.  The sensible thing to do would be to slow down to the 8:40s, which was the pace I was originally planning to run.  Somehow, I was afraid to slow down.  It wasn’t rational, but I thought if I unhitched myself from the runners around me, I would slow down too much, and then I wouldn’t be able to speed up again.  Experience told me my current effort wasn’t going to be sustainable for the whole race, but I stuck with it out of this irrational fear of slowing down.

At one point, I saw a spectator holding up a sign that read, “Bears 7, Jaguars 3.”  The Chicago Bears were playing in London.  It was an afternoon game there, but in this time zone, it was a morning game.  I had a similar experience last weekend at the Twin Cities Marathon, when the Minnesota Vikings were playing in London.  If I didn’t know better, I would think the NFL consults marathonguide.com before planning their schedules.

At 10 miles, if was easy to compute my average pace.  I was averaging 8:31 per mile.  That’s 15 seconds faster than my target pace.  Already, I was two and a half minutes ahead of schedule, but I pressed on.

At another aid station, I heard them playing “Walking on Sunshine” by Katrina and the Waves.  That’s another fast-tempo high energy song.  I just fed on it.

I was also feeding off the energy of the spectators.  There were thick crowds everywhere, and they were cheering us on.  It reminded me of how I always feel running through Brooklyn during the New York City Marathon.  The crowds get you so excited that you just can’t contain yourself.

Sometimes during a race, I’ll reach a particular mile or kilometer marker and I’ll think about where I would be on a different course that’s familiar to me.  At 20K, it occurred to me that if I was running the Boston Marathon, I was be arriving at the “Wellesley Scream Tunnel.”  I always feel fresh at that point in the race.  I was at the 20K mark of this race, and I definitely didn’t not feel fresh.

I’ve had lots of other races where I ran the first half at a pace that felt like this.  About 95% of the time, the wheels came off in the second half.  The other 5% of the time, I went on to do something special.  At this point in the race, I fully expected to blow up in the second half, but I kept going at the same pace.

Ever since the first mile, my watch was consistently recording splits long before I reached a mile marker.  I usually looked at it, but I didn’t trust what it was telling me.  When it prematurely recorded a split for mile 13, the time it had for that mile was much slower than my previous miles.  I didn’t think I slowed down in that mile.  It was easy to believe I might run out of gas at any time, but I was still keeping up with all the runners around me.  When I finished mile 13, I saw that I actually sped up in that mile.

I reached the halfway point in 1:51:32.  I was almost three and a half minutes ahead of my target time.  I was roughly on pace to finish in 3:43.

I can still remember my all-time fastest marathon.  It was the only time I every broke three hours.  For the first half of the race, I thought I was running way too fast.  I expected to blow up.  When I still felt OK at the halfway point, I started to believe that I might not blow up.  I was now at the same point of this race.  I didn’t have that same confidence.  I still expected to blow up.

I began to lose my fear of slowing down.  My primary goal was to run a Boston qualifying time.  After running the first half of the race at a pace that was at least 15 second per mile too fast, I could now afford to slow down by roughly 30 seconds per mile in the second half.  I could, but I didn’t.  Knowing I had room to slow down emboldened me to keep up the pace.

My watch gave me another wonky split for mile 14.  It said I sped up to 7:02 in that mile.  We were back in the downtown area, so we had been near tall buildings in that mile.  I had every reason to distrust my watch, but I did suspect I may have sped up a little.  I was curious to know what my time would be when I actually finished that mile.  Unfortunately, I got distracted and forgot to look.

That was the beginning of a pattern.  For the next several miles, I was only remembering to look at my watch every other mile.  My two-mile splits were usually 17 minutes or faster, so my average pace per mile was 8:30 or faster.

We were heading west now, and I felt much more wind.  I don’t know what the wind direction was before, but now it was definitely a headwind.  That was a huge relief.  The wind went a long way toward cooling me down.  Also, it wasn’t sunny any more.  For the rest of the race, we had cloud cover.  That was just what I needed.

Somewhere around here, I realized that my digestive system had stabilized.  I no longer felt like I needed a bathroom stop.  I wouldn’t stop until after the race.

Maybe it’s because I was running with more confidence, or maybe other people were starting to slow down.  I started to notice lots of slower runners in front of me.  I had to look for openings, so I could move around them.

We crossed a street that runs diagonally.  Chicago has lots of those.  As I looked down that street, I saw a Church’s Chicken restaurant.  I suddenly remembered running past one in this race in a previous year.  As I looked closer, I saw a stream of runners going the opposite direction on a different street.  They were going right by Church’s Chicken.  This was the restaurant I remembered.  We just weren’t there yet.

Soon, I entered a block with a sign saying, “Charity Block Party.”  On both sides of the street, there were dozens of canopies set up.  Each one had the name of a different charitable organization.

Shortly after the charity block party, I saw a huge Mexican flag on the side of a building.  It was the Mexican consulate.  As I entered that block, I saw spectators holding up Mexican flags.  There are several ethnic neighborhoods in the second half of the race.  I knew we would go through a Mexican neighborhood at some point, so I thought we were there.  I was wrong.  That neighborhood would come later.

We reached the western edge of this section of the course and turned left.  We passed the 25K mark.  Then we turned again.  Now we were heading back toward the city center.  Ahead of me, I could see the 16-mile sign.

We continued toward downtown, and we eventually passed Church’s Chicken.  It’s funny the things that stick in your memory during a race.

As we turned and briefly headed south, I recognized most of our surroundings, but one thing seemed different.  We ran by a CTA station on the blue line.  There was a roof that extended over the street from that station.  I don’t remember running under that before.  Was this a new building, or is my memory faulty?

We turned and headed west again.  Soon we ran through a neighborhood where I saw posts painted with the colors of the Italian flag.  We had reached the Italian neighborhood.  I heard a spectator say we had three more neighborhoods, but I don’t know which ones he meant.

Somewhere between 18 and 19 miles, we reached the westernmost part of this section.  Even before I turned the corner, I remembered exactly where the 19-mile mark was.  I also remember how I felt when I got there in previous years.

As I turned the corner, I looked ahead and saw a large digital clock.  That was the 30K mark.  When I reached 30K, my watch was already recording a split for 19 miles.  The 19-mile mark wasn’t visible yet.  It was under a bridge.

When I reached 19 miles, I had 7.2 miles to go.  I remembered another year when I reached this point and wondered if I could run those last 7.2 miles in an hour.  I was almost on pace to do that this year, but not quite.  The more relevant question was whether I could run those last 7.2 miles in 69 minutes.  If I could do that, I would run a Boston qualifying time.

I had a lot of room to slow down.  At this point, I could slow down by a minute per mile and still be on pace for a BQ.   Knowing that gave me the confidence to keep running hard.  I didn’t feel like there was much risk now.  Even if I ran out of gas, I wasn’t likely to slow down by more than a minute per mile.  I felt like I didn’t have anything to lose, so I went for it.

As we turned the corner and headed east again, we ran through the Mexican neighborhood.  There was music, and lots of Mexican flags.

As we continued east, I eventually spotted a bridge in the distance.  I remembered this bridge.  I also remembered, that there was a slight ramp coming up to the bridge.  In any other race, you wouldn’t call it a hill.  In Chicago, it may be the biggest hill on the course.  If not, it’s the second biggest.

This was another bridge with carpet, but only on one side.  There were runners walking the bridge, and there was barely enough room to get around them while staying on the carpet.

Just after the bridge, I reached the 21-mile sign.  After another block or two, I entered Chinatown.  This is my favorite neighborhood in the whole race.  It’s a colorful neighborhood, and the crowds really turn out for the race.

After Chinatown, I had to run one more mile to reach Michigan Avenue.  The last few miles of the race are on Michigan Avenue, running north toward Grant Park.  First, however, we had to turn right and head south on Michigan Avenue.  It bothered me to know I was running away from Grant Park.

On the other side of the street, I could see runners who were already heading north.  Looking ahead, I could see the 24-mile sign, but it was on the opposite side of the street.  I wasn’t even to 23 yet.

This was another area where I had to work to get around slower runners.  It was more understandable now.  Most people start to slow down in these late miles.  I wasn’t showing any sign of slowing down.  With fewer miles to go, I was running with more confidence.

When I finished mile 23, I checked my time.  The first thing I asked myself is if I would still break 3:50 if I slowed to 10 miles per mile the rest of the way.  The answer was yes, by a wide margin.  I could slow to 11 minutes per mile, and I would still break 3:50.  My BQ was absolutely in the bag.  I could afford to slow down, but I didn’t want to.  I wanted to finish strong.  Now, it was a matter of pride.

We made a small loop, and then we got back onto Michigan Avenue going north.  This is the part of the race where I’ve always struggled to maintain my pace.  Some years, I’ve struggled just to finish this section.  I had been looking forward to getting there, but it’s a part of the course I usually dread.

The wind had apparently shifted.  Earlier it seemed to be coming from the west.  Now, it was definitely coming from the north.  It was also much stronger now.  This was the wind I had been expecting.  Running into this wind, my hands got cold.

I heard another high-energy song.  It was “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now).”  That’s what I needed to hear.  It pumped me up, and I put even more energy into my pace.

One of the impressive things about this race is that they have signs for every kilometer, in addition to every mile.  When I reached the 39K sign, I had 3,200 meters to go.  That’s the equivalent of eight laps around a track.  That thought wasn’t actually all that helpful.  I wouldn’t know when I completed each 400 meters, so I couldn’t count down those laps.

When I reached the 40K sign, I had the equivalent of five and a half laps around a track.  That’s better than eight laps, but it still wasn’t all that helpful.

After the 25-mile sign, there’s a one mile to go sign.  I looked at my watch.  If I kept up the same pace, I would run negative splits, but it might be close.  That lit a fire under me.  I had a new goal now.  I ran much faster the rest of the way.

I reached the 41K sign.  Now I had just 1,200 meters.  That’s like three laps around a track.  From there out, there were signs every 400 meters, so that was now a useful way to look at the remaining distance.

When my watch recorded a split for mile 26, I was nowhere near the 26-mile mark.  It was still about half a mile away.  It said I sped up to 7:59 in that mile, but I didn’t know if I could trust it.  I was speeding up, though.

I reached the 800 meters to go sign.  Now, it was just two laps around a track.  I poured it on.

I made the turn at Roosevelt and started climbing up to the bridge over some railroad tracks.  If the bridge at 21 wasn’t the largest hill, this was.  I ran up the ramp as hard as I could.  I don’t know if I maintained the same pace, but if I didn’t, it wasn’t for lack of effort.

At the top of the bridge, there was a 300-meters to go sign.  I started running downhill, and then I reached the final turn.  There was a 42K sign.  There was also a 200-meters to go sign.

After that last turn, I could see the finish line.  I tried to run hard, but I was running out of gas.  Then I reminded myself that I was running for negative splits.  I still thought it might be close.  It wasn’t even remotely close.  Those last two miles were my fastest of the race.

I finished in 3:41:07.  I ran negative splits by almost two minutes.  I still can’t believe how strong I ran.  Two of my fastest races this year were on courses that descended at least 3,000 feet.  Excluding those two races, this was my second fastest marathon of the year.

As I moved through the finish area, I knew it wouldn’t be long before I started getting cold.  I was going to put on my jacket, but then I saw the volunteers handing out heat sheets.  That was easier.  Best of all, this is one of the races where there are volunteers taping the heat sheets in place, so your can keep your hands free for other things.  The only other races I know that do that are New York City and Boston.

Post-race food included bananas, apples, energy bars, Rice Krispy bars, and donuts.  Beverages included water, Muscle Milk, and beer.

Mary was volunteering in the food area, so I was hoping to see her after I finished.  I stayed in the finisher chute longer than I should have so I could look for her, but I wasn’t able to spot her.

I made my way to the gear check tents to retrieve my gear bag.  Then I made a bathroom stop before leaving Grant Park to walk back to my hotel.  They had a post-race party area with more beer, but I just wanted to get back to my room and get cleaned up.

I spent the rest of the afternoon refueling, recovering, and relaxing at the hotel.  In the evening, I went to Navy Pier to have dinner with friends who traveled here from England.  We have a few friends in common, so I also knew some of the runners from the US.

I had to get up early on Monday to get to the airport for a morning flight.  It was much colder, and there was some rain.  I’m glad we didn’t have those conditions for the race.

Race statistics:

Distance:  26.2 miles

Time:  3:41:07

Average Pace:  8:26 per mile

First Half:  1:51:32

Second Half:  1:49:35

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  530

Boston Qualifiers:  171

World Marathon Majors:  27 (Boston x 13, Chicago x 6, New York x 4, Berlin x 2, London, Tokyo)