Boston Marathon Recap

Before Boston, I had won them all.

Monday changed that.

Before this race, I had always experienced tangible success in all of my marathons. In Lake Placid, my first one, I had completed it while also winning my age group. In Philadelphia the first, I had finally qualified for Boston, a feat I feared I would never achieve. The Vermont City Marathon brought me under the 3-hour mark for the first time in my marathon career, even after taking 2 weeks off with a severely sprained ankle. And, Philadelphia the second engendered a belief where I could consider myself a legitimate marathon competitor with my PR of 2:42:52.

Going into Boston, my training was of higher volume, quality and intensity than ever before. While I knew that breaking 2:40 would be no run around the park (pun intended), I didn't come close to worrying about accomplishing my goal until about 3 weeks out when I mangled my hand (see previous post). While I only missed one day of training due to my wounded hand, the trauma my body endured likely set me back a bit. Yet, being the naive 21-year-old I am I felt that I didn't lose too much.

The morning of the race saw me rushing to get to the bus drop off. No, I wasn't running late; the hotel I was staying in encountered a customer, or, somebody that I'd now like to strangle, pull the fire alarm in my hotel at promptly 5 a.m. I, in a borderline zombie-like state, gathered my necessities as expediently as possible and exited the hotel earlier than expected to head to downtown Boston. Once there I realized that, in attempt to collect my racing requirements in the most whirling of dervishes, my gels were still in the hotel room. Sans a cell phone (for fear of losing it), I had no way to call my parents to get the gels so I could refuel during the race.

Marathoners of any type, be they fledglings to the sport, first-timers or even seasoned vets know not to run a marathon on no fuel. It's a death sentence. The key is to begin refueling early in the race so that it helps offset that wall that makes so many runners irascible on the course. Part of the reason why I had such a breakout performance at Philadelphia in November was that of my sage coach, Pete Colaizzo, and I conceived a plan to refuel earlier in the race. Instead of refueling at mile 18 when it's too late to have any meaningful impact, I'd start taking gels at around mile 13 and every 3 miles or so until the finish. On Monday I had no option. All I could rely on to get me to Boylston St. under 2:40 were some water, Gatorade and pure guts.

Through the half I arrived in 1:19:20 and felt so strong. Too strong almost. While my first 5K was an unheard of 18:34 (to put that into perspective, I ran a 5k in cross country in September in 18:30) I slowed down into a solid rhythm that saw me run even splits effortlessly. It's that area that all runners yearn to get to during a marathon. I was truly "in the zone."

This lasted until mile 19, where I instantaneously felt my lull I usually encounter in this area. My strategy going into the race was to start out aggressive, refuel properly, fight the lull between miles 18-21, then use my second wind I always experience until mile 24 and combine that with using the advantageous downhills and sail home.

Yet, that's not quite how things panned out.

Mile 19 saw me at an overall 6:07 pace per mile which would have yielded a 2:40 finish. I felt tired but totally in control. Once I got to mile 22, the combination of over 100,000 feet run and a lack of hydration and refueling set in, essentially having me run in torture until the finish, where I ended up running 2:44.

My family and close friends who were there with me saw the complete feeling of dishevelment branded on my face. I was wholeheartedly devastated with how I did not even PR for the first time, but I also failed to complete a goal in a marathon for the first time. Initially, I was clueless with how to deal with the disappointment.

Disappointment led to thinking, and thinking, and thinking for days, trying to decipher what went wrong, how it didn't go to plan and why I failed. After hours of laboring over the result, I have come to the forthcoming conclusion:

Me running 2:44 is like the venerable Ryan Hall running 2:08. Both are exceptional times, but not quite personal best times. Ryan Hall doesn't PR every time he runs a marathon. Not even Haile Gebrselassie, recognized world record holder at 2:03:59, breaks his own record every time he competes. To think you can do so every time you go out is flat out asinine.

I'll never make an excuse for my performances, Monday included. Sure, my body endeavored into some trauma the past three weeks, I was without gels and that likely affected me mentally. For whatever reason, it wasn't meant to be on Monday.

While this certainly doesn't alleviate the sheer disappointment of not accomplishing what I yearned, I've learned more from this race than almost any other race. I know now to be more prepared before race day and to not be so mentally malleable, to rely on a mental focus that, I must reluctantly admit, wasn't fully there on race day.

The anger and frustration of not attaining what I sought to yields all the motivation I'll ever need to go back and break 2:40 at Boston next year. I know the course. I know what I'm up against. I know who you really are, Newton Hills, and you too, downhills. I know what it takes, mentally and physically, to get up at 5:30 a.m., take an hour bus ride to Hopkinton, wait 2 hours at the athlete's village, then line up to race. I know it all now.

On April 16, 2012, be ready Boston. This time, it's personal.

Humble (Fat-Free) Pie

It's the most important part of a runner's diet.

And it's something I should have eaten all along.

Just like a typical 22-miler on a Saturday morning, you can become so engulfed in your training that you become so quickly to forget about setbacks and holds. The, "What if?" is for mortals. Injuries? For the weak. Bad days? Not for me. I'm too good for that, too strong to ever have a bad day.

Then I had not only a bad day, but a bad week of training.

It all started with a Saturday night out at my friends' local favorite establishment. With only 23 days away from the biggest moment of my waking existence at that point, it would have behooved me to not go out and have a few beers with the gang. What was supposed to be an easy night ended up being a night of horror that ended with me walking out of the E.R. at 4 a.m.

As I was out, I bent down to pick up a bottle so I wouldn't step on it and cut myself. Fortunately, my lower extremities were unscathed. Unfortunately, my hand wasn't, as I lost my balance while picking up the bottle, put intense pressure on the bottle to keep balance, which eventually led to the beer bottle shattering on my hand. Fifteen stitches later, I was dejected, thinking I wouldn't be able to run the race I have had on my calendar for over 540 days. Instead, I am able to run, but with a 3 pound soft cast to show for it after reconstructive surgery to regenerate the nerve damage I so elegantly did two weeks ago.

Surgery was Wednesday. More importantly, the final long run was Saturday. 23 miles, with 6 easy, 16 of tempo at marathon goal pace, and 1 to cool down to top it all off. I was still in pain. I was held back by a 3-pound weight on my hand. What it ended up being was 5 easy miles, 15 miles of tempo pace around 4 seconds too slow per mile, and then death. I had no energy left. I was entirely spent, after only 20 miles. This couldn't be. My worst long run was my last long run. Maybe it was the cast, or the percoset, or the fact that I just was out of shape. Maybe it was a bad day. Whatever it was, doom was imminent. Or was it?

The recent events of the last week engendered an epiphany. While my diet boasts my daily servings of fruit, grains, protein, and ample amount of fluid, I totally forgot about my humble pie (fat-free of course. I am a runner after all).

Until this point, my training was completely uninterrupted. If there was ever such a thing as smooth sailing, this was it. It seemed inevitable that I would break 2:40 in Boston on the eighteenth. Now, doubt swarmed me like a starving wolfpack.

Yet, I know now just how lucky I am that I still can run. That I am prone to bad days, especially after being on painkillers and undergoing anesthesia 72 hours prior to a 20 mile run. That if it happened to my legs, there would be no chance of me running in the 115th Boston Marathon, lining up with Ryan Hall, Kara Goucher and Robert Kiprono Cheruiyot. It may not have been a perfect week, but it was still a week of training, a week that will make me stronger, make me better, make me tougher .

Because I am so lucky, I will not let this moment fade away. I cannot, and will not, let my goal be unattained, for it would be wasteful. Just as I was wasteful of my fat-free humble pie earlier. No more.

And, maybe if I do break 2:40 in ten days, then perhaps I'll even have a piece of non fat-free pie to celebrate.

The Voice

Nights like these keep me up every once in a while.

perhaps it's the peculiar way I'm cerebrally programmed, but sometimes there are just these intangible feelings that are simultaneously so enthralling and, well,
frightening.

You see, I firmly believe that we all have inside of us this intrinsic Voice that demands our attention. It tells us to follow a certain path, sometimes blindly, and to not question it, nor second guess yourself, but to just follow it and see where it goes.

Maybe a poor analogy, or pun, or both, but my running has garnered these thoughts from me. I think that's normal for any of us with an ardent fervor for something, whether it be running, our profession, traveling, anything. We question at some points if this is what we should be doing, if it is worth it, if we are capable of being the best at what we yearn to do. Nobody wants to be satisfactory at their passion. If they do, well, then that's not their passion.

Ever since I started running after I graduated high school just 2-and-a-half years ago, I've followed the path to becoming a 4-time marathoner blindly. I never asked questions. I only ran more, and more, and more, until I reach the point where running 23 miles on a Sunday morning doesn't seem too daunting. I'm neither proud nor upset by this. It's just what I have become, for better or worse. So much has been sacrificed on my part due to my passion for running: fun with friends, time with family, time devoted to other activities, schoolwork, even relationships have suffered due to my commitment. Sometimes, I think this Voice is wrong.

Or maybe I'm just making excuses.

Maybe the jury is still out on that. Maybe I run so much to satiate some internal desire of mine. Maybe it's just the fear of being overweight again like I was for so many painstaking years of my childhood. I guess the reality is that it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter why we focus so much on what drives us, what inspires us, or why the Voice tells us to speed up, not slow down, and just keep going.

What matters is the process. If you cannot be satisfied, or happy, with the journey of greatness (that could also very well lead to failure), then you're doing the wrong thing. Pick something else to take up your time. The Voice gets its own pleasure in seeing the development of the path, the end of the road.

For some, it may be a promotion, the nailing of a presentation, or getting elected. For me, this is my path with my end. And, when I reach it, I am ever so positive that The Voice was right all along.

Marathon Recap

            As some of you may know, either from knowing me personally or through reading previous posts (most likely the former), I ran in the Philadelphia Marathon on November 21st, three short weeks ago.  For one of my classes, I was asked to keep a "running" diary of sorts about my experience before, during, and after the race, this is what I came up with.  This, I try to explain, is what it is like to run a marathon, and the insane emotional and physical roller coaster you endeavor while running it. Enjoy:

            Twenty six point two miles. 

            One hundred thirty-eight thousand, three hundred thirty-six feet.

            It’s almost double the distance between Florida and the Florida Keys.

            I ran that distance nine days ago. 

            On Nov. 21, I ran in the Philadelphia Marathon for the second time in my short life and marathon career.  It was the fourth overall marathon I have competed in, but one thing stays the same.

            It doesn’t get easier.

            Sure, I may have dropped my time 41 minutes so far, from the marathon fledgling I was in 2009 at the Lake Placid Marathon where I ran 3:23:17, (an average of 7:46 pace per mile) to the runner I am now with a personal best of 2:42:52 (an average of about a 6:12 pace per mile). In reality, however, times don’t matter. 

With a race of this magnitude, this difficult, this daunting, it’s more about the adventure and how you get there than your actual finishing time. 

Marathons have experienced an exponential increase in the last five years due to the most recent running boom that has expanded the sport of running (and, in particular, marathoning) to a new, never-before attained level. 

Yet, still, less than 1% of the American population run a marathon each year.  And, understandably so.  Marathons are asinine to even consider attempting, as it asks for your undivided mental capacity and focus, as well as your best day physically, for all to go well and not hit that disdainful wall, to not pass out at mile 18, to just plain survive.  Excruciating mental pain, physical agony, or both, isn’t just likely.

It’s inevitable.

Perhaps the toughest part mentally is waking up at the ungodly hour of 5 a.m.  Or, maybe it’s the waiting around before the gun goes off, thinking, just thinking, about the wild ride you’re about to go on.  You start to question everything, from what you ate for breakfast, to your training, to the guy next to you.  Did I eat too close to the starting time? Am I in good enough shape? Can I beat this guy next to me?

            Boom.

            That’s the sound of the gun.  All previous thoughts are tossed aside from the brain and all focus is now upon the 26.2 miles ahead.  Adrenaline is so abundant and ubiquitous in the body, in the atmosphere, that you try to start out slowly so that you don’t burn out at mile 22, when you still have four miles left to go. 

            The first mile was a little too fast, as it always is.  About 25 seconds too fast.  At least it felt comfortable, I thought.  Maybe this isn’t too bad after all.  Let’s try to hold this pace for now.

            That pace stayed consistent for the first 11 miles or so with no real variation.  Perfect, I thought. I’m feeling great.  This will be a piece of cake! 

            Mile 13 saw me go into the halfway point at precisely where I thought I could be on a flawless day.  Could I be flawless for the second half? Maybe. Hopefully. 

            My coach Pete Colaizzo left me with a valuable lesson before I left for Philadelphia.  Colaizzo, the director of cross country and track and field at Marist College, a venerable marathoner in his own right with plenty more experience than I, told me not to “crush” miles 12-18.  That’s the point where you would get into a “groove” he said, and perhaps burn out before the most important part of the race which begins at mile 20.

            He was right.

            Around mile 19, I felt myself starting to slow down as I was approaching the final turnaround to head home.  Each step seemed to just take double the amount of energy it did before.  The blisters on my toes and heels became unavoidable.  My thighs felt like cinderblocks.  I was out of breath.  My 20^th mile was the slowest of all.  It was clocked in at 6:39, over 30 seconds what it should be at this point and no sign of recovering. 

            “Let’s go Luke,” random benevolent spectator said. “You’re on your way home!”

            “Okay 344,” said a kind runner who was dually experiencing the pain I was feeling. “You look great.”

            I am positive that I did not look great, for I did not feel even good and guarantee I didn’t look it, either.  Maybe it was the endorphins.  Maybe I was hallucinating.  But I had no tangible evidence to the contrary.

            So I believed them.

            Mile 21 was a little faster, at 6:17.  Better, I thought, and I’m not dead yet! I push a little harder with only five miles to go.

            Mile 22 was much quicker, 6:01.  I’m back, I thought.  Only four more miles left!

            Mile 23 was the same at 6:01.  Yes! Only a simple five-kilometers left to go. In the midst of my second wind were cries of, “You got ‘em kid! Stay strong!” said runners as I passed them.

            Mile 24 was a tad slower at 6:11.  The blacktop felt like quicksand as my legs were getting sucked into it.  My brain tried to distract me, but the pain was too difficult to overcome.

            I hit the wall.

            Mile 25 was when the crowd started to formulate and cheer the runners on the home stretch.

            “Pump those arms,” spectators said. “You’re so close!”

            I was digging, digging, like I was using a shovel, to get my legs to move quicker, to bounce off the blacktop to no avail.  My arms fell asleep from being in the same position for hours on end.  Each step was as if spears were stabbing the bottom of my feet.

            But, at mile 26.2, with steps to go, I limped across the finish line with a 15 minute personal best time, a smile on my face that travelled from ear lobe to ear lobe, and blisters the size of a quarter on each foot. 

            Even my legs, my indispensable legs who carried me and worked ever so valiantly for those two hours and 42 minutes, could not take any more, as they developed a pulse of their own, with each beat shooting an influx of pain that viscously simmered for hours.

            Yet, all of it did not matter, as satisfaction, and personal glory, were both attained. Which, I suppose, begs one, final question to everyone else.

            Want to run one?

           

Luck

What is it, exactly?

This is a question that I have been venturing out to answer for quite some time.  It seems like a simple question.  At least I thought it was.  But, the reality is that it is so far from simple. In fact, it just may be impossible to answer such a question.

Luck, I guess, by definition, is the fortunate, (or unfortunate) occurrences in your life that just happen, well, because.  I would have to say that it is a phenomenon that is borderline inexplicable. We truly do not know why one has good or bad luck in particular instances, but we do know that it is poingant and always with us.

But can this omnipotent facet of life be as powerful and free-falling as is generally suggested? Is that even humanly possible.

Know what I think?

No.

I consistently labor over such questions as these ad nauseam.  My friends will tell you that I am a victim of consistent over-analysis of just about everything from a text message that ends in a period to why I ran 30 seconds slower on my 10 mile run today than when I did it three days earlier.

But this luck thing, I have concluded, that for the most part doesn't even actually exist as this spirit.  Truth is, luck is synthetic. It's man-made.   We all are responsible for our own luck.  People that are primarily considered to have bad luck have it because they put themselves in situations that will be unlikely to engender good luck. Therefore, they will have bad luck.  Whether that be not exhibiting healthy practices and eventually paying for it down the road, or being painfully unprepared to the point  where you could humiliate yourself publicly. 

On the contrary, those that have "good luck" are progressive. They're confident.  They do not fold at those tumultuous times.  Nothing phases them.  They have the gall and patience to see things through and make the right decisions when necessary. Those with good luck will downright refuse to just let life, the intimidating adversary it can sometimes be, come to them. They go to life. Thus, producing their own good luck.

Now, of course, there are outliers.  The mother of three who succumbs to vicious breast cancer after beating it decades earlier.  The dedicated man who works three jobs to support his family, and gets fired from one of them so he can't pay the mortgage.  The family who wins the lottery. These are just a few examples that just illustrate that there are some moments in life that have no explanation. There's no use in even trying to look at those examples because you'll drive yourself up a great wall looking for an answer. 

Instead, go make your luck.