Gafoo's Blog

Official Time=3:29:31 – Apparently I am actually faster than I give myself credit for but I should probably do some longer training runs to help prevent leg explosions. Strap in kiddies, this is a long one…

So after logging 768 training miles and pouring myself (gradually) into hundreds of articles on running this summer I find myself to actually be a runner. To clarify: I feel like an athlete. For the longest time I felt like just a guy trying to lose some weight and I used some races to get there. However sometime between when I ran the LA marathon, ran another 13 miles in the same week as the LA marathon, spent quite a few weeks running every single day, went on to pass 1000 miles in under a year, decided I would run a 50 mile Ultra-Marathon, and plunked down the cash for the Long Beach Marathon…somewhere in all that mess I realized that I have become a runner. I was telling Alyssa recently (mainly because I have been thinking about it for a while) I went from 225lbs of virtually no activity to running a half marathon and 2 full marathons in one year. As a matter of fact, in a few more days it will actually be the anniversary of when I decided that enough was enough and got off my lazy ass to start this journey. I still remember vividly that first night of chugging along on the treadmill after work for one sweaty miserable hour of light jogging but mostly walking equaling about a 16 minute per mile pace (that would be a marathon in excess of 6.5 hours!!!). I know if asked that guy on that night if he ever thought that he could turn into the athlete I am today I’m sure he would laugh in my face. To tell you the truth, I kinda wish I could do that…but anyway, enough with the “I am so great” talk and on with the race details.
I woke up (with the help of my awesome wife) at around 3am to get dressed. Why did I wake up so early? I wanted to get in a warm up run (yes I am crazy) and it worked with my transportation choice as well: the metro train. So I woke up at 3am, got dressed, ate my race breakfast (scrambled eggs with hot dogs and some diet Dr. Pepper to wash it down) and set out on a 3mi run down to the NoHo train station and boarded the train to head down to Long Beach.
Next up on the checklist was getting to the portapotties. I wanted to get in my ritual pre-run poop. I figured I would be ready to go since I had food this morning and I ate oatmeal the night before but alas, it wasn’t in the cards. It was mildly disconcerting since I had used the restroom on almost every single long run during this training cycle. I had a feeling I would be looking for a portapotty on the race route which would have supremely pissed me off. Thankfully it never happened but it did stress me a little bit during the first half of the race. Funny thing about trying to use the restroom though, I couldn’t untie my shorts and wound up breaking the drawstring on them so in order to run the race without having my shorts fall down I wound up completely ghetto rigging them up with the broken drawstring. It worked great but wasn’t pretty. Oh well…
I lined up in the 1st wave in spite of signing up for the 2nd wave. I decided that since I was trying for a 1st wave time I should head out with them. To be honest the 1st 12 miles went by so fast I don’t remember much about them. I do remember hitting the 10k mark at around 48 mins (actually 47:10 – 7:36 pace) which worried me a bit as I thought I wanted a larger buffer (I was mistakenly doing my pace calculations on 6 miles and not 6.2 miles) to make sure I hit 3:30. I lost that worry though when shortly after the 8mi mark I over took the 3:20 pace group. I never intended to do that but I was listening to my mp3 player (like I had done all summer) and ran a couple fartleks based on the song pace that came on (for your info it was Helmet-Exactly What You Wanted and Smashing Pumpkins-That’s the Way (My Love Is)). I kept my position in front of the 3:20 pace group until around the 19 mile marker and felt great doing so. More on that later though,
Like I was saying, I don’t remember much about the first half of the race. when we got to the approximate 1/2 location (the sensor bar was actually at the 12.9 mile marker) I saw I was at 1:35 (1:35:16 – 7:24 pace) and finally concluded that I was indeed running at a great pace and didn’t really have to worry about that buffer. It was here that I ran the fastest actually and for a few miles I was in striking distance of the 3:10 pace group. I remember thinking that I would be so cool if I had it in me to BQ. In hindsight I probably could of ran with the 3:10 pace group: I still felt fantastic but I also thought not to get lured in by the mirage of the middle miles. The hardest part of the race is the end when you have nothing left and even though I could have caught up with the 3:10 group I didn’t want to run out of gas doing it.
It was at mile 18 that I realized I was really hitting my maximum potential. It was solidifying to see that time clock: 2:17 (2:16:55 – 7:37 pace) because I knew I was hitting a pace that one time during the summer made me uncontrollably vomit. It was so great to see that time now because I wasn’t distressed at all…I had in fact gotten stronger since the aforementioned vomit run. I was blowing past my puke threshold pace.
Mile 19 was definitely my wall moment: My hamstrings started to twitch a little so I decided to slow my pace a bit. I remember my plan was to turn on the fast playlist at the 1/2 way point, then the day before I decided I would give myself a little bit longer and turn it on for the last 6mi, then when I slowed down, I decided that I would run at the reduced pace, stay strong, and turn on the speed for the last 4mi.
So at mile 22, after running at my reduced pace for around 3 miles, I felt strong enough to hit the fast playlist and run the rest of the way out. I thought if I was lucky I would catch the 3:20 pace group but either way I was gonna surpass my goal time. Apparently my legs didn’t want in on this plan. About 1 minute after I took off at my faster pace (I estimate it to be around 7-7:15 pace) my left leg decided to cramp up. I felt a huge knot in my hamstring and I had to walk it out. After about an 1/8 mi (estimate) I started running again at the fast pace and sure enough in another minute my right leg decided to cramp up in the same place. I had to walk again. I estimate it was around the same distance that I walked. I felt a little pissed that my legs we’re cramping on me cause I really had the juice to keep going. Rest assured I will be examining my situation to find out the cause of this cramping: maybe I should actually retire these shoes with over 1000 miles on them!
At any rate, to avoid cramping up and walking the rest of the race I figured I should just run my safer slower pace and shoot for my actual goal time. Soon enough I saw the 3:30 pace group (I use the term group loosely as there was only 1 guy with him that eventually slowed down as well) pass me and decided that cramp or no cramp I would keep that damn pacer close by. I ran slightly behind him for the last 1.5 miles and finally when I saw the 26 mile marker I decided that I would sprint the end.

I remember a few key points about that last sprint:
1. The finish line seemed much more intense and adrenaline inducing than the LA marathon. Perhaps because the road leading up to the finish line was so much more narrow than LA it felt like the spectators were right next to me.
2. the pacer finished pretty much exactly at 3:30 (gun time not chip time) which I thought was extremely BAD ASS!
3. I single-handedly ruined 4 other runners finish line photos by sprinting right up the middle. That is unless they like sharing the spotlight with me.
4. The cramps in both legs MOST DEFINITELY came back during the sprint but I didn’t care about the pain. I just focused on seeing the 3:30 up on the time clock.

So that was my marathon. I ran exactly my goal time and learned that I am actually faster than that. A BQ is in the works for next year. I really thought it was a long way off but I think I am gonna attempt it on my next marathon. Still haven’t decided for sure what that marathon will be though. I would like to run LA 2010 but I also want to run the California Racing Series which would mean my next race should probably be San Francisco (to be economical about it anyway). Though I have heard that is a very tough race. Maybe not a good time to try for a BQ. I’ve got some time to figure it out though. Time for some rest and healing now.

On the logistics: the course was pretty great. I really liked running along the shoreline, seeing the fireboat spraying the water canons, running the bridges etc. It was weird that there were so many repeated streets though. I am new to the world of marathon running but it was weird running past mile 16 which was also later mile 22 (and several other areas of the course like that). I kinda wanted to see more of the city.
It was cool that they had Gu on the course since I didn’t take any of that stuff with me. It was nice to have. Throughout this whole summer training I only used food once (some Clif Shot Bloks) on a long run. I got myself quite used to having just a single bottle of Gatorade for any run over 12 miles. And actually I am done with Gatorade as well. I think I’ll stick to Powerade or something with less sugar. Gatorade is WAY too syrupy. It’s not really refreshing. At any rate, the Gu points were very wisely chosen as well as they coincided with the uphill portions of the course. It made the “tougher” segments really fly by.
By far the coolest section of the course was the segment through the CSULB campus. Not that the campus was particularly scenic but because the kids on campus we’re such awesome cheerleaders on the course. I couldn’t help but smile as they seemed so enthused to cheer on anyone and everyone with such aplomb. It was quite awesome. It made me feel great. Sincere thanks guys and gals.
This really isn’t a logistics point but it was REALLY awesome to have wife, daughter, brother, and sister there at the finish line. Thanks for coming out to Long Beach and cheering me on. Yup, they knew me (and loved me) when I was fat and their support means the world to me. Thank you so much.

Also, if you made it this far, you just read a marathon (wouldn’t be a blog post without a cheesy, uncreative line). Thanks for reading. Pictures to come soon.