How I Did On My 2021 Goals

I always start the year by posting a set of goals for the year.  At the end of the year, I review how I did.  It’s that time of year.

Usually, my goals involve specific races, performance goals, and places I’d like to visit.  This year was different.  I knew going in that 2021 was going to be a rebuilding year, so my goals were to heal from injuries, rebuild my mileage base, and get back to a lean weight.  I had some degree of success with each of those goals, but I also had some degree of backsliding.  It seemed I would take two steps forward and one step back.  Later in the year, it was two steps back.  Here’s how I did in more detail.

Heal from Injuries

In August of 2020, I injured my right knee.  Shortly after that, I ran marathons on 20 consecutive days.  After that, I cut back on my training, but I still ran several other races.  By the end of the year, it was clear I needed to take a break, but I still had one more race scheduled.  That was at the end of January.

On the last day of January, I ran the Big Beach Marathon in Gulf Shores, AL.  That race has some long sections of boardwalk.  The wood planks of the boardwalk were a little bit springy, which forced my knee to absorb extra shock.  After that race, my knee was much worse.  Later that day, I could only climb stairs by leaning on a railing and using my upper body.

In early February, I saw my doctor.  An MRI confirmed that nothing was torn, but after nearly six months of running on an injured knee, it had become chronically inflamed.  My doctor knows how much I ran, and he knows how many marathons I ran since injuring my knee.  I believe his exact words were, “You’ve dug yourself into a deep hole, and it’ll probably take a while to dig back out of it.”  He estimated I would need to take a month off.  I was more pessimistic.  I thought it might take as much as two months.  As it turns out, we were both too optimistic.

February came and went.  I didn’t do any running.  I was doing physical therapy for my knee.  Other than that, my only exercise was walking a mile once or twice a day.  I didn’t plan to try running again until I could walk up and down stairs without discomfort.  My physical therapist gave me some additional exercises to help me maintain strength in my legs until I could run.

March also came and went.  I needed to get more exercise, so I gradually increased my walking to as much as four miles a day.  I also started doing short low-resistance spins on a stationary bike.  I had to be careful not to push with my quads.  Instead, I just pulled on the pedals, but without any pushing.  That limited the intensity of my workouts.  Still, it was the only thing I was doing that actually felt like a workout.

I felt improvement in my knee, but it was much too slow, and I was getting out of shape.  Around the middle of April, I decided to give race-walking a try.  Before that, I was just walking at a casual pace.  It was exercise, but it wasn’t training.  I would’ve tried race-walking sooner, but I didn’t know if it would aggravate my knee.

My first race-walking workout was 2.25 miles.  My average pace was 11:28.  I was pleasantly surprised to be able to go that fast.  I hadn’t done any race-walking since the previous summer, and I hadn’t been serious about it since 2018.  The important thing is that it didn’t bother my knee at all, even though I was going as fast as I could.  That was a relief.

Once I knew I could race-walk without aggravating my knee, I started working on getting back in shape.  My training went well for almost a month.  Then I injured my lower back.

Four years ago, I took up race-walking while recovering from a back injury that required surgery.   That injury was more serious, but it was also much higher in my back.  I found that walking at a fast pace caused a lot of rotation in my lower back, but it didn’t cause any twisting in the middle of my back.  With a lower back injury, I had to be more careful.

I had to cut back to just walking at a casual pace, but only temporarily.  Before long, I was walking at a brisk pace.  Then I was back to race-walking, but holding back a little on the pace.  It took about six weeks, but the back injury eventually healed, and I was able to train hard again.

By now, it was late June.  My knee was improving, but I wasn’t ready to run yet.  I tried a few run/walk workouts where I would run for as much as a quarter of each mile, but I was mostly walking.  At first, even those workouts aggravated my knee.

From February through June, I didn’t have any races.  I was able to race-walk, but I had to rebuild my endurance before I could entertain thoughts of walking a marathon.  I didn’t want to race until I could finish one in six hours or less.

From July through October, I race-walked several marathons, a 5K, a 10K, and a 12-hour race.  I also tried a run/walk mix in one of my marathons, but I didn’t like the way my knee felt afterwards.

I eventually starting doing run/walk workouts more often, and I occasionally did runs on the treadmill, where I could lessen the impact by running uphill the whole way.  Then in late October, I had a big breakthrough.  I race-walked the first 17 miles of the Monkey Marathon, but ran the rest of the way.  The next day, Deb and I toured a castle, and I had to walk up these steps.  It didn’t hurt.  When I could walk up and down a steep staircase like this the day after running nine miles, I knew I was finally ready to try running an entire marathon.

The first marathon where I ran the whole way was the New York City Marathon.  That race has a few big bridges.  Running the downhill sides of the bridges caused some discomfort in my knee, but it didn’t seem to do any lasting damage.  Within a few days, I was back to walking up and down stairs without discomfort.

Two weeks later, I ran the Philadelphia Marathon.  I ran much faster in this race.  Instead of holding back going downhill, I started running downhill with gusto.  I had a little discomfort on stairs the next day, but the day after that my knee felt OK.

I wish the story ended there.  It took me almost all year, but my knee was about 95% healed.  It wasn’t perfect yet, but I could run marathons.

On the morning of the Philadelphia Marathon, I noticed some slight discomfort around me right hip.  At the time, I didn’t think much about it.  In retrospect, it was probably a nerve impingement.  In the days leading up to that race, I had been doing some extremely vigorous walking workouts.  I probably injured a disk in my lower back.  Running hard on the hills made it worse.  The next day, I couldn’t move without pain in my lower back.

I felt much better the next day, but I knew it would take weeks for my back to heal.  Since then, I’ve trained cautiously.  Most days, I put in a few miles, but I hesitate to even call it training.  When I run, I have to go uphill to minimize the impact.  That limits me to running on a treadmill.  When I walk, I have to slow the pace to the point where I don’t feel any rotation in my lower back.  Previously, I had been consistently race-walking at a pace of 11 minutes per mile or faster.  Now, my pace has to be 16 minutes of slower.

I’ve done two other races since the Philadelphia Marathon.  The first one was the Rehoboth Seashore Marathon.  This race had some boardwalk sections.  Wary of the experience I had at the Big Beach Marathon in January, I walked those sections.  Where it was paved, I ran, but at a cautious pace.

More recently, I ran the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon, which descends more than 3,700 feet.  When I signed up for this race, I was worried that it would aggravate my knee.  That turned out not to be a big concern.  Instead, I had to worry about my lower back.

After the race, I had discomfort going up steps.  Fortunately, that only lasted for one day.  I feel like I dodge a bullet in that race.  My back didn’t feel any worse after that race than it did after the Rehoboth Seashore Marathon, and it definitely didn’t feel as bad as it did after the Philadelphia Marathon.

Again, I wish the store ended there.  Sunday evening, we had a winter storm.  We got a few inches of snow, followed by freezing rain.  When it was over, our driveway had about an inch of densely packed snow, with an icy crust on top.  I went out to shovel the driveway the next morning.  My back didn’t hurt while I was shoveling, but it started to bother me a few hours later.  By the end of the day, I could barely function.

At first, I thought I injured my lower back in a big way.  Now, I think it was mostly sore muscles.  That said, I was already recovering from a lower back injury, and lifting all that heavy snow didn’t make it better.  I’m still looking at taking it easy for a few more weeks before I can do any real training.

Rebuild My Mileage Base

In 2019 and 2020, I ran an average of 55 miles per week.  On top of that, I was also walking, cycling, and doing weight training.  At the peak of my training in 2020, I doing the equivalent of 19 miles per day.  That’s what prepared me to run marathons on 20 consecutive days.

In the first month of 2021, I only ran 100 miles.  Then I took a break to give my knee a chance to heal.  My goal was to gradually rebuild my mileage base once I got healthy.  I didn’t expect to get back to my previous level this year, but I thought I could get close and then build on that in 2022.

As it turns out, I wouldn’t run again until June.  I put in lots of race-walking miles during the summer months, but I wouldn’t run 100 miles in a month until November.  Since then, I’ve regressed.  I can’t start building my mileage again until my back heals.

I ran a total of 562.7 miles in 2021.  It was the first time since 1987 that I didn’t run at least 1,000 miles.  The good news is that I walked 1,833.6 miles, so my total mileage was closer to 2,400 miles.  That’s not as much as recent years, but it’s in the ballpark.

As I begin the new year, I’ll once again have to wait to heal from an injury before I can pick up my mileage.  At the moment, I’m only doing three or four miles of a day.

Get Back to a Lean Weight

My last major goal for 2021 was to lose weight.  For most of 2020, I had a monster training load, and my eating habits reflected that.  As I was forced to cut back on running, I was slow to adjust my eating habits.  In the last three months of 2020, I started gaining weight.

I expected to continue gaining weight as I took a break from running.  I thought I’d have to get healthy first, then rebuild my mileage base, and then lost the weight.  I really thought it would have to happen in that order.  It turned out to be almost the opposite.

At the beginning of February, I knew it would be at least a month or two before I resumed running.  I was so worried I would keep gaining weight, that I got serious about changing my eating habits.  I began keeping track of everything I ate.  I also kept track of how many calories I ate, and I set a daily limit.  If I didn’t know how many calories were in a food, it was off my diet.  I stuck to these rules rigorously for almost three months.

This approach wouldn’t work for everyone, but it worked for me.  The longer I was able to stick to these rules the easier it got.  Initially, I was just hoping to limit the damage.  When I started losing weight, it gave me the motivation I needed.  Even before I was able to resume running, I was back to my racing weight.

As I picked up my race-walking mileage during the summer, I was able to eat more.  I still kept track of what I ate, but I allowed myself to eat a little bit more.

Eventually, I got complacent.  Even though I was burning more calories, I started to gain weight again.  As long as it was just a pound or two, I didn’t worry too much.  By the end of the summer, I was walking at least 50 miles a week, so I was confident I could easily lose a pound or two if I got serious about it.

Soon, one or two pounds became three or four pounds.  Then it was five pounds.  That was late November.  Then I re-injured my back, and my training load dropped like a rock.  The timing couldn’t have been worse.  It was just before Thanksgiving.  Holiday meals, sweet snacks, and a reduced training load meant more weight gain.  I’m finishing the year pretty close to where I started.

This was a rebuilding year, and 2022 is shaping up to be another rebuilding year.  My goals for next year will probably look familiar.

What About Races?

At the start of the year, I listed some races I was hoping to run.  I didn’t know when I would be ready to race, nor did I know when international travel would be feasible.  At the start of the year, I didn’t even know when I would be eligible to get vaccinated.

Here are the races I identified and whether I got to run them.

New England Challenge – This six-day series is held in May.  By February, I realized I wasn’t going to be ready for anything like this in May.  As it turns out, I wasn’t in shape to finish one marathon, much less six in a row.  Fortunately, I never registered for any of these races.

Firecracker Triple – The last Firecracker Triple was supposed to be held in 2020.  When it was cancelled, I was hoping to run it in 2021.  The 2021 Firecracker Triple also got cancelled.  That’s just as well, since I wouldn’t have been ready to run it.  Now it’s scheduled for 2022.  It’s on my wish list, but we’ll have to see if I’m healthy enough to train properly for it.

Mad Marathon – I was signed up to do this race in July of 2020.  The race was held in 2021, but it was postponed to September.  I’m still interested in doing this race, but it fell on the same weekend as the Tallin Marathon.  I didn’t know if I’d be able to do that race this year, but I wanted to keep my options open.  As it turns out, I didn’t do either race.

Alaska Series – I cancelled a lot of other plans, but I was able to do this series.  I made it a priority as soon as Alaska rescinded its quarantine requirement.  When I realized I wouldn’t be able to run these races, I worked hard to get in shape to race-walk them.  It gave me an opportunity to finally complete a quadzilla in Alaska.

International races – For the first time in more than a decade, I didn’t travel outside the United States.  It would’ve been possible to do the Tallinn Marathon in September, but I would’ve needed to walk it.  Also, I didn’t know if I would be able to do all the same sightseeing I had planned when I was signed up to go to Estonia in 2020.  I decided to put this off for another year, when I can have a better race and travel experience.

Boston Marathon – The race was postponed to October, but I got to do the race in person (rather than virtual) for the first time since 2019.  Returning to Boston for the first time in two and a half years was probably the highlight of my year.  I wasn’t ready to run yet, but I was able to race-walk it in less than five hours.  I also had reunions with a few different running clubs.

New York City Marathon – This race was deferred from 2020.  It’s the largest race I did this year, and it was the closest to a normal (i.e. pre-pandemic) race experience.

Minnesota races – I did six marathons or ultras in Minnesota this year.  I used four of them to get in shape for the Alaska Series.  I also did a 5K race and a 10K race.  I race-walked all of them.

Other Accomplishments

I had five noteworthy accomplishments that weren’t goals at the start of the year.

1) I finished first overall in the 5,000 meter race-walk event at the Minnesota Senior Games.  That qualified me for the National Senior Games in May.

2) I finished first overall in the We Walk Marathon.  It’s not the first time I’ve been the first place walker in this race, but this year I also finished ahead of everyone who was doing a run/walk mix.  I was the first person ever to walk this race in less than five hours.

3) I set a PR for walking a 10K race.  I finished a 10K race-walk event in 1:02:51.  That’s an average pace of 10:07.

4) I qualified for Boston at the Philadelphia Marathon.  I thought I would need to resort to qualifying in a downhill race.  Qualifying on this course was a pleasant surprise, especially when you consider that almost all of my training was race-walking.

5) I also qualified for Boston at the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon.  That was noteworthy, because it was the 150th time I’ve qualified for Boston.

Race Report: 2021 Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon

On December 19, I ran the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon on the Big Island of Hawaii.  This race starts in Volcano and finishes in Hilo.  It descends almost 4,000 feet, making it a very fast course.

I ran the inaugural race in 2017.  That was the year that I had back surgery in June and didn’t run at all for the next three months.  I race-walked several marathons, but I didn’t run a marathon until I did this one.  I was terrified.  I didn’t know if my back had recovered sufficiently for me to run marathon, much less a downhill marathon.  As it turns out, my back was fine, and I ran a surprisingly fast time, considering that almost all of my training was race-walking, rather than running.

It seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.  This year, I’ve also been mostly race-walking.  I got back into race-walking in April, because I was recovering from a knee injury.

When I signed up for this race, I was concerned about how my knee would handle a downhill race.  I signed up for it because I thought it was a quick and easy way to get a qualifying time for the 2023 Boston Marathon.  The alternative, I assumed, was six months of intense training, which couldn’t begin until my knee was 100 percent.

As it turns out, my knee is doing much better.  I ran my last few marathons, but most of my training has still been race-walking.  In spite of that, I had a surprisingly fast time in the Philadelphia marathon four weeks ago.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that I injured my lower back in that race.  For this race, I was no longer worried about whether my knee would handle the downhill running.  Instead, I was worried about how my lower back would handle all the impact.  Worried might not be a strong enough word.  I think I was just as terrified this year as I was four years ago.

Until recently, you couldn’t travel to Hawaii without a 10-day quarantine.  Now, it’s possible to bypass the quarantine if you’ve been vaccinated for covid-19.  The state of Hawaii has created a website called Safe Travels.  A few weeks ago, I created an account and uploaded my proof of vaccination.  Then I entered all details of my trip.  The last step was to fill out an online health questionnaire with 24 hours of my flight.  Then they sent me a QR code that I needed before I could board my flight.

Thursday, December 16

I flew to Honolulu and then had a short inter-island flight to Hilo.  When they scanned my Safe Travels QR code in Minneapolis, they gave me a wrist band.  Having that wristband allowed me to bypass the document check in Honolulu.  For people who didn’t have a wristband, it was a long line.

My hotel was fairly close to the airport in Hilo, so I didn’t have to drive too far.  Still, by the time I checked in, it was 9:00 PM.  In my own time zone, it would’ve been 1:00 AM, so I was tired.

I stayed at the Grand Naniloa Hotel.  This is a nice hotel on the coast, near downtown Hilo.  They don’t have a swimming beach, but they have a pool, a restaurant, and ocean views.  It’s tough to arrive and immediately go to sleep, but I got to bed as soon as I could.

Friday, December 17

I slept until 6:00 AM, and I could’ve slept later.  I only got up when I did because I happened to glance at the clock.  I easily could’ve gone back to sleep.

The race wasn’t until Sunday, but I arrived a couple days early, so I would have time to do some sightseeing.  After breakfast, I drove to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  From Hilo, it was a 45 minute drive.  Before leaving, I went online to get the latest news on volcanic activity within the park.  I read that Halemaʻumaʻu crater was filling with lava.

The highway leading to the park is basically the marathon route, except I was driving it in the opposite direction.  This was a chance to reacquaint myself with it.  As soon as I got out of Hilo, I noticed I was going uphill.  The road never seemed steep, but it was uphill all the way to the park.  It was a reminder of what a 4,000 foot elevation change looks like.  It scared me a little.

The national park is basically self-service right now.  There wasn’t anyone at the booth where you would normally pay to enter the park.  Instead, you can pay at the visitor center by putting the money in an envelope and dropping it in a box.  The visitor center is closed, but there’s usually a park ranger outside to answer questions.  When I got there, there wasn’t any ranger, so I was on my own to find the best place to view the eruption.  I made a point of getting to the park early, because the parking lots all fill up if you wait too long.  Not having a chance to ask questions was the downside.

There were maps highlighting a few places where it’s possible to view the eruption.  I started with the Kilauea overlook.  The road to get there was partially closed, so I drove as far as I could and hiked to the viewing points I could get to from there.  From this side of the crater, all I could see is stream rising from the crater.

While I was there, I talked to two other tourists who said you could see more from an overlook on the opposite side.  I went there next.

Many of the roads and trails in the park are closed for safety reasons.  I drove as far as I could on Chain of Craters Road, but had to stop and park where the road was blocked off.  I parked in the parking lot for Desolation Trail, but there was a sign saying you couldn’t see the eruption from that trail.  The sign directed tourists to hike for a mile on Chain of Craters Road instead.

As I started walking down the road, I was curious why it was safe to walk, but not safe to drive.  I got my answer after walking about half a mile.  One lane was impassible because of this crack.  You could still walk around it in the other lane, but two-way car traffic would’ve been a problem.

Eventually, there was a sign showing where to leave the road and walk to an impromptu viewing area.

When I got close enough, I saw steam rising from a vent near the western wall of Halemaʻumaʻu crater.  I looked closer and saw a small spatter cone rising from the crater floor.  Occasionally, I would see a red-orange flash as lava spattered from the top of this cone.

It was tough to get good pictures with my phone.  I had to zoom in as far as possible and then try to hold the phone steady enough that the pictures wouldn’t be blurry.  My pictures weren’t always timed well, so they really didn’t capture everything I was seeing.

There was a sign requesting that we only stay and watch for 10 minutes, so others can get a chance to see.  It wasn’t crowded yet when I was there, but I left after about 10 minutes and hiked back to the car.

Before leaving the park, I drove back to the visitor center to see if there was a park ranger there.  When I saw the ranger, I asked her if there were any other parking areas within walking distance from that viewing area.  I was interested in coming back in the evening to see the same view after dark.

The ranger said there’s another parking lot that’s a half mile farther from that viewing area, but it’s small, and both of these parking lots tend to be full all afternoon and well into the evening.  She suggested the only way to be sure of finding parking was to come after 8:00 PM.

On my drive back to Hilo, I drove through a brief rain shower.  That was a reminder that I was on the rainy side of the island.  I had to be prepared for the possibility of rain during my race.  I also had to be prepared for rain in the park if I came back later.

When I was here four years ago, I discovered a restaurant in Hilo called Café Pesto.  I remembered they had good pizza, so I went there for lunch.  I had their luau pizza, which is topped with pulled pork, pineapple, and smoked mozzarella.  You haven’t really had pineapple on pizza until you’ve had one made with fresh pineapple.  Canned pineapple isn’t the same.

After lunch, I went back to the hotel to relax for a while.  When I arrived the night before, it was already dark, so I never noticed the view from my hotel room.  In daylight, I had a nice ocean view.

Here are some of the views from the hotel grounds.

Before long, it started to feel hot.  It was only 77 degrees, but the humidity was high, and direct sunlight in Hawaii is pretty intense.  To best enjoy the weather, I found a beach where I could spend the rest of the afternoon swimming in the ocean.

By the time I got back to the hotel and showered, it was almost time for dinner.  I considered driving back to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and taking my chances on finding parking.  When I saw dark clouds in that direction, I changed my mind.  I think I made the right call.  It rained all evening, and I kept hearing thunder.  Instead of going out again, I had dinner in the hotel restaurant.

Earlier in the day, I thought I had adjusted well to the time zone.  After dinner, I realized my body was still adjusting.  I was already getting sleepy.  Rather than fight it, I went to bed early.  I slept well for about half the night, but I spent the second half resting in bed, trying to get back to sleep.

Saturday, December 18

It wasn’t raining when I got up, but a shower passed through while I was eating breakfast.  There was more rain in the forecast for both Hilo and Volcano.  That made it difficult to plan my day.  I tended to stay close to Hilo, never committing to anything that would have me outside for longer than I could count on dry weather.

After breakfast, I visited a number of oceanside parks that are just south of Hilo Bay, near the airport.  Some of them are called “beach” parks, but they aren’t really what I would call a beach.  They had rocky shorelines that aren’t suitable for swimming.  They’re more suitable for a picnic with ocean views.  Each of these pictures is from a different park.

I waited for a brief rain shower to pass.  Then I drove to the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Gardens, which are about 10 miles north of Hilo.  They have a paved trail loop through the rainforest, with 2,000 species of plants.  There are also streams with waterfalls and ocean views.

I had to wait out another brief rain shower.  Then I went to the Pana’ewa Rainforest Zoo in Hilo.

While I was at the zoo, it started sprinkling lightly.  As I was leaving, it started raining harder.  It would’ve been a good time for a lunch break, but I was still full from a big breakfast.  I opted to skip lunch in favor of an early dinner.  I went back to the hotel to take a break and wait for the rain to stop.

Packet pickup was at the Boy Scouts of America camp in Hilo, which is also where the race finishes.  When I picked up my race packet, I found out I was going to be in the first wave.  I also confirmed that the course doesn’t have any mile markers, so I needed to use my GPS watch if I wanted to know where I was on the course.  One of the race organizers grows bananas on his property, so they were giving out bananas.  I picked up one to eat for breakfast.  Finally, the race shirt was a long sleeve T-shirt with this artwork on it.

For dinner, I went back to Café Pesto.  Instead of driving, I walking to and from dinner.  That turned out to be a mistake.  On my way back, I got caught in a rainstorm.  I walked back as quickly as I could.  It was the fastest I’ve walked in weeks.  The good news: walking that fast didn’t bother my back.  The bad news: my clothes were soaked.  Fortunately, I had a different pair of shoes to wear for the race.

I needed to get up early, so I went to bed as early as I could.  I basically took off my wets clothes and climbed right into bed.  I was asleep by 7:00.  I slept well for about five hours.  Then the fire alarm went off, and a recorded message told us all to evacuate the building via the nearest exit.  I assumed it was most likely a false alarm, but I had to evacuate until they knew that for sure.

The clothes I wore earlier were still wet, so I had to find clothes that were dry.  My shoes were also wet, so I had to wear the running shoes I brought for the race.  After getting dressed, I grabbed my phone and room card and headed for the nearest stairwell.

I didn’t take the time to grab my wallet, which was also still wet.  I also left my car keys and other important things in the room.  As I followed the other guests down seven flights of stairs, it occurred to me that I’d be in a bad situation if the building was actually on fire, and I lost everything I left in the room.

When I got outside, it was raining.  I had to find a place where I would have shelter from the rain.  I was running out of dry clothes.  I was also wearing my only dry pair of shoes, and I needed to wear these shoes for the race.

About 10 minutes after leaving the building, we got the all clear to return to our rooms.  I knew it would be a long wait for an elevator, so I took the stairs again.  By the time I got back to my room, I was wide awake.  I climbed back into bed , but I wasn’t able to get back to sleep.  When it was time to get up, I was still awake.

Sunday, December 19

Sunday was race day.  I had to take a bus from the finish area to where the race starts in Volcano.  The bus left at 4:30 AM.  I didn’t want to risk missing it, so I got there almost 30 minutes early.  It’s not as if I lost any sleep by arriving early.  I had been awake since midnight anyway.

It was still raining when I got up, but the rain stopped before I left the hotel.  It started raining again shortly after I got to the boy scout camp.  There was a building there with bathrooms.  As soon as the rain stopped for good, I made a bathroom stop.  Then I boarded the bus.

It took about 45 minutes to get to the starting area.  The race started on Pi’imauna Drive, next to a golf course in Volcano village.  The bus stayed there until after the race started, so we could sit on the bus and stay warm.  The temperature at the start was 57 degrees.  That was several degrees warmer than it was four years ago, but it still would’ve been chilly if we had to wait outside for 45 minutes.

The race started at 6:00.  It was still dark, and the highway we were running on wasn’t closed to traffic.  We had to wear brightly-colored clothes, carry flashlights, and run on the shoulder.

We had to start the race in waves of 25 runners each.  The waves started five minutes apart.  I was in the first wave.  On Pi’imauna Drive, there was plenty of room to run.  When we turned onto Highway 11, the shoulder was narrow, so there wasn’t any room for passing for at least a mile.

Pi’imauna Drive is downhill.  When we turned onto the highway, it was slightly uphill, but only for a few minutes.  Then we reached the sign marking the high elevation on the road, which is 4,024 feet.  After passing that sign, the road leveled off and gradually turned downhill.

I didn’t have to think too hard about how fast to start.  I just followed the runner in front of me.  I didn’t have room to pass, and I didn’t want to hold up traffic for people behind me.  I just locked into the same pace as the runner ahead of me.

This race descends 3,768 feet from start to finish.  This was the sixth time I’ve run a marathon that descends that much.  It took until the fourth one to learn how to do it right.  The most important lesson from my first three downhill races is that you shouldn’t try to control your pace.  Trying to do that not only wastes energy, but it’s harder on your body.  The best thing to do is to stay relaxed and find the pace that feels easiest.  Once I had room to run at my own pace, that’s what I did.  I tried not to put any extra energy into going faster, but I also didn’t waste any energy slowing myself down.

The first time I ran a steep downhill race, I developed Achilles tendonitis.  It’s really easy to overstride when you’re running downhill for an entire race.  I eventually learned that I had to take short rapid strides to guard against overstriding.  That’s easier said than done.  It takes strong flexible hips.  Fortunately, race-walking is the perfect way to train for it.

I ran the first mile in 8:31.  I thought that was a good pace, considering that mile was relatively flat.  It was faster than a Boston-qualifying pace, and that was my primary goal.  I knew, in all likelihood, I would run faster than that.  My best guess was that I would finish with a time in the 3:30s.  In 2017, I ran it in 3:28:13, but I think I was better trained that year.

In the second mile, there was a little more room on the shoulder.  I passed two other runners in that mile.  It was slightly downhill, so it was faster.  I ran that one in 8:01.  The third mile was similar.  I slowed by just a few seconds.

I’m not sure how my pace in those three miles compare to 2017.  I was wearing a different watch then.  It recorded my splits, but I couldn’t read them in the dark.  The watch I wear now lights up briefly when it’s displaying a split, so I was always able to read them.

Roughly three miles into the race, we turned onto Old Volcano Road, which allowed us to bypass the highway for almost two miles.  I suspect the course is laid out that way to make it easier to find room for aid stations.  This early in the race, there just wasn’t enough room on the shoulder of the highway.

This was my favorite part of the course.  There’s hardly any traffic on this road, so we were no longer confined to the shoulder.  It also allowed us to bypass a hill.  On Highway 11, the road is more sharply downhill, but then turns uphill.  On Old Volcano Road, it was only slightly downhill, but it never turned uphill.

While I was still on Old Volcano Road, I recorded my split for the fourth mile.  It was 7:45, which was just a few second slower than the same mile in 2017.

By the time we returned to Highway 11, there was enough light to see without using a flashlight.  There were two aid stations where you could drop off a flashlight, but I put mine in my fanny pack.  It doesn’t weigh much, and I didn’t want to risk it getting damaged.

For the rest of the race, the highway had a wider shoulder.  Now there was plenty of room to run, and if necessary, there was room to pass.  By now, we were getting pretty spread out, so there wasn’t much need to pass.

We were starting the fastest section of the course.  For the next few miles, the grade was about as steep as it gets.  I ran the fifth mile in 7:18.  That surprised me.  In 2017, I ran that same mile in 7:41.  That made me wonder if I would continue running that fast.  I did.  My next two miles were 7:20 and 7:13.

In 2017, one of my rules was to never second-guess my pace.  I maintained a fast cadence and let gravity do most of the work.  I didn’t worry if the pace seemed too fast.  At the time, I didn’t know how fast I should expect to run.  This year, I could compare my splits to 2017.  I was going faster, but I didn’t know why.  Was I better at maintaining a fast cadence or was I putting too much effort into it.

Ideally, I wanted to put effort into my turnover, and I didn’t want to put any additional effort into forward motion.  Maybe I was also putting effort into speeding up, but I didn’t realize it.

I tried to compare my effort in this race to my effort four weeks ago in the Philadelphia Marathon.  I didn’t think I was working harder, but I was working different muscle groups.  It wasn’t as easy comparison.

The shoulder had a slight camber to it.  It wasn’t enough to feel uncomfortable, but we were on the same side of the road for the entire race.  I wondered if I was striking the ground hard with one leg.  I wondered if that would gradually take a toll on my back.  For the time being, I wasn’t noticing my back, but I wasn’t that far into the race.

There was more than one layer of asphalt.  The top layer covered the driving lanes and about half of each shoulder.  The layer underneath was wider.  The outer half of the should only had this one layer.

The top layer of asphalt was in better condition.  It didn’t have any crack or potholes.  Unfortunately, it was this layer that had a noticeable camber.  The layer underneath wasn’t as smooth, but it was move level.

At first, I was running on the right side of the shoulder, which had the better quality pavement.  Eventually, I switched to the left side, so there wouldn’t be as much camber.

The aid stations were spaced roughly two miles apart.  Half of them had water and Gatorade.  The other half just had water.  I drank Gatorade if it was available, but I always drank something.  Because I was going so fast, I usually had to stop or slow to a walk while grabbing a cup.

After about seven miles, the grade leveled out a bit.  We were still going downhill, but it wasn’t as noticeable.  For the next four miles, my splits were in the 7:40s and 7:50s.

At times, I saw what looked like hills.  I noticed the same thing when I was driving the road in this direction.  I wasn’t sure if the road was actually turning uphill, or if it was an optical illusion.  When you’re going downhill and the road ahead of you levels off, it can look like it’s uphill.

In my next mile, I slowed to 8:01.  I don’t think that mile was actually uphill, but it was closer to being level.  On sections like this, I allowed myself to take a longer, more relaxed stride.  When the road turned downhill again, I switched back to a short rapid stride.

The mile after that one really seemed like it was slightly uphill.  I commented to another runner, who also thought it felt like we were going uphill.  Next to the road, there was a ditch.  Water from recent rains was draining down a hillside into the ditch.  Inside the ditch, the water was flowing downhill.  From the direction the water was flowing, it was obvious that we were, in fact, running uphill in that mile.

I ran the uphill mile in 8:09.  That really surprised me.  I wouldn’t have expected to run that fast in a flat mile, much less than an uphill mile.  I wondered if I put too much effort into that mile.

As the road turned downhill again, I got back to my previous pace.  My next several mile times were all in a range between 7:39 and 7:51.

So far, I was running faster than I did in 2017.  I think I started to get emotionally attached to the idea of breaking 3:30 again.  That, in turn, led me to push too hard in some miles.

This race doesn’t have any mile markers, but there are mileposts along the highway.  We turn off the highway and run to the finish line just before reaching milepost 4.  Anywhere else along the highway, you can get a good estimate of the remaining distance, by subtracting four from the current milepost.

I thought I was about 12 miles into the race when I saw milepost 16.  I was actually only 12 miles from finishing.  I had been reading my splits after every mile, but I never looked at the distance my watch was recording.  Instead, I was just counting the miles in my head.  Sometimes, I noticed my time for the last mile, but didn’t mentally record that I had finished another mile.  I was pleased to realize I was already in the second half of the race.

A couple miles back, I saw a video camera on the side of the road, next to two volunteers who were recording each runner’s bib number.  At the time, I thought I was only 11 miles into the race.  I thought that was an odd place for a checkpoint.  Now, I realized that was the halfway point.

There are signs next to the highway for every 500 feet of elevation change.  A couple miles back, I had seen the 2,000 feet sign.  I realized now that it was pretty close to the halfway point.  In the first half of the race, we descended more than 2,000 feet.  In the second half, we would descend closer to 1,700 feet.  The second half isn’t quite as fast.

By now, I was noticing some drizzle.  It wasn’t enough to get my clothes too wet, but it started to rinse sweat off my face.  I noticed a salty taste in my mouth as the sweat washed into it.

As you descend toward Hilo, the temperature and humidity both climb.  The late miles can feel brutally hot.  The drizzle helped with that.  We also had a persistent breeze.  That also helped with the heat.

In the first half of the race, we rarely crossed another road.  As we got closer to Hilo, we occasionally came to an intersection.  There were volunteers in orange vests to make sure we got through each crossing safely.

At one crossing, I accelerated as I crossed the street, even though no cars were coming.  As I did that, I briefly felt a twinge in my right knee.  I only felt that the one time.  It’s odd that my knee bothered me on this brief acceleration, yet never bothered me when I was running downhill.

Before much longer, I noticed my lower back for the first time.  That discomfort was more persistent, but it was something I could easily tune out.  I always knew this race would be hard on my back.  I was just hoping it wouldn’t do too much damage.

When I saw milepost 14, I knew I had about 10 miles to go.  I remembered finishing mile 15, but I didn’t remember finishing mile 16.  Once again, I noticed my time for a mile without updating my count of how many miles I finished.  It wouldn’t be the last time.

For most of the race, there were mileposts every mile.  As we got closer to Hilo, I sometimes saw mileposts with half mile increments.  The first one of those I noticed was milepost 12.5.  At that point, I could tell myself I had 8.5 miles to go.  I was slightly more than two thirds done.  I realized, however, that the remaining third would be as difficult as the first two thirds combined.  I could tell by now that my pace was taking a toll on me.  I was feeling the fatigue.

With roughly eight miles to go, I saw the sign for an elevation of 1,000 feet.  I had descended 1,000 feet in the previous five miles.  That’s an average of 200 feet per mile.  In the remaining eight miles, I would descend less than 800 feet.  That’s less than half as steep.  I wondered now if I would be able to keep up the same pace.  For the next two miles, I did, but I had to work much harder.

It was still drizzling.  It wasn’t coming down any harder, but the road was completely wet.  I sometimes felt spray from passing cars.  I also noticed that the pavement was getting slick.

With six miles to go, the drizzle finally stopped, but the road was still slick.  As we got closer to the finish, but pavement was much more smooth.  I was starting to notice a loss of traction.

I ran mile 21 in 8:07.  At first, I was disappointed that I was no longer faster than eight minutes per mile.  Then I asked myself what pace I was hoping to average the rest of the way.  I realized I’d be pretty happy if all my remaining miles were as fast as 8:07.

With five miles to go, I needed to average roughly 8:41 per mile if I was going to break 3:30.  When I compared that to my current pace, it sounded easy.  Then I reminded myself that my average pace in the Philadelphia Marathon was only two second faster than that, and that was an effort that took everything I’ve got.  It’s not as easy pace.

My next mile took 8:22.  That wasn’t as fast as the previous mile, but it was faster than I needed to be.  Then I sped up to 8:07 in the next mile.  With three miles to go, I could break 3:30 by averaging nine minutes per mile.

This is the point where the race starts to get tough.  Mile 24 is the toughest mile of the race.  It starts out flat and ends with a hill.  On the flat section, I could tell I was slowing down, but I tried to limit the damage.  Then I got to the hill.  Previously, there had been sections that were only slightly uphill.  This was the first hill that really looked and felt like a hill.

As I started up the hill, I quickly ran out of gas.  I wasn’t trying to keep up the same pace.  I was just trying to get to the top.  At first, I wanted to slow way down.  Then I realized what I really wanted to do was walk.  If I merely slowed down, I probably wouldn’t break 3:30, but I would only lose a few minutes.  If I started walking, I could give up huge chucks of time.  I worked too hard for too long to give it all away in the last few miles.

My next mile split came right at the top of the hill.  I ran that mile in 9:20.  The only way I could break 3:30 now was to speed up again in the last two miles.  I could see the next mile was downhill.  It didn’t help.  Even going downhill, I couldn’t pick up the race.  When I finished that mile, I was dismayed to realize I actually slowed down.  I ran that mile in 10:22.

Now I was just struggling to get to the finish.  The next mile seemed to go on forever.  I knew we would eventually leave the highway to turn onto a road called Stainback Highway.  I knew we would cross another road just before that.  In the distance, I could see two runners who were well ahead of me.  One was wearing a bright yellow shirt.

I came to a crossing that I assumed was the one before Stainback.  Looking ahead, I expect to see the runners ahead of me turning.  They kept going straight.  The next crossing wasn’t Stainback.  When I finally reached that crossing myself, I saw it was Mamaki Street.  This was the street before Stainback.

Ahead of me, I could still see the yellow shirt.  I also saw an orange shirt.  Then the yellow shirt disappeared.  I realized the person wearing orange was the volunteer showing us where to turn.  All the volunteers wore reflective orange vests.

I still had to get to that turn myself.  I was moving slowly, just grinding it out.  I knew exactly what to expect when I made that turn.  I would only have two tenths of a mile to go, but it was all uphill.

I forget if I saw my 26 mile split before or after the turn.  I ran that mile in 10:47.  I knew I was close to the finish, but I couldn’t see it.  There’s a bend in the road before the finish.  I could see the hill, but I couldn’t see the finish line.

When I finally saw it, I did my best to finish strong, but I had nothing left.  I eventually crossed the line in 3:33:43.5.  Officially, that’ll go into the books as 3:33:44.  That’s a Boston qualifier with more than 16 minutes to spare.

At the start of the day, I expected a time in the 3:30s.  That’s what I did, but the way I did it was disappointing.  I was 11 minutes slower in the second half of the race.  I can attribute about half of that to the first half of the race being easier.  The other half was just poor pacing.  More than once during the first half of the race, I wondered if I was working too hard.  I was.  It wasn’t sustainable.

After I crossed the line, I was offered a glass of water.  I knew I had been sweating heavily, so I eagerly accepted it.

The finisher medals for this race resemble dog tags, but they have artwork similar to the T-shirts.  In addition to the medal, each finisher received a bag of coffee grown on the island.

There were a variety of post-race snacks.  After finishing my water, I had a can of Pepsi and a Nutri-Grain bar.  I wasn’t ready to eat anything more than that.

Immediately after the race, I had sore hamstrings and calves and tight Achilles tendons.  Surprisingly, I didn’t notice any soreness in my quads.  I didn’t notice any soreness in my back immediately after finishing, but I noticed it after driving back to the hotel.

I rinsed off the sweat and then took a hot bath to loosen up my stiff muscles.  I stretched my quads, hamstrings, calves, and Achilles tendons.  Then I worked on my calves and hamstrings with a massage stick.

The pants and shoes that got wet yesterday were dry now, so I was able to get dressed and go to lunch.  I didn’t feel like driving anywhere, so I had lunch at the hotel.  My favorite post-race meal is pizza, but I have a tradition of celebrating a BQ with BBQ.  I was able to do both.  The restaurant at the hotel has a BBQ pork pizza.

When I signed up for this race, I needed a BQ for 2023.  I qualified in Philadelphia, so I didn’t really need a qualifier in this race.  I was strongly motivated to qualify again in this race, because I came into this race with 149 lifetime Boston qualifiers.  This was my 150th BQ.

As I compiled a few statistics for this race, I noticed an interesting one.  My average pace was 8:09.  In the entire race, I only had five miles that were slower than that.  Three of them were the last three miles of the race, and those miles were much slower.

Earlier, I had thoughts of going back to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in the evening, so I could see the glow of the lava after dark.  After the race, I realized that wasn’t feasible.  I didn’t think sitting in the car for that long would be good for my lower back.  I also didn’t know if I would be up to two or three miles of hiking.  Finally, I had been awake since midnight, and I didn’t know how well I could handle driving back in thee dark when I would be fighting to stay awake.

I fully expect I’ll have more soreness tomorrow.  The real question is how much my back will bother me.  I’ll have a better idea in the next few days.

Race Statistics

Distance:  26.2 miles

Time:  3:33:44

Average Pace:  8:09 

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  447

Boston Qualifiers:  150