Monday, October 19, 2009

A Few Thoughts about the Columbus Marathon

I’ll probably take the time to organize all my thoughts about my recent Columbus Marathon finish but for now I thought I’d write a few random thoughts about my day and the marathon in general.

As I woke up the day after the marathon it was just another reminder of how hard road running is on the body. After I stretched and took a nap after the race yesterday I met some friends out to celebrate our marathon finishes. I felt really great, very few aches and pains, which I wasn’t expecting. Well I woke up this morning and my left knee is killing me and I’m very stiff. I can’t remember ever feeling like this after a trail race (100 miler excluded).

I was blown away with all the huge PR’s people set yesterday. Almost everyone who followed Tim’s speed-workout regiment had 10+ minute PR’s yesterday, myself included. All but a few qualified for Boston.

Columbus really is a first class marathon. The course is fantastic, the neighborhood support is fantastic, and the event is very well managed. I was a little disappointed to not be doing one of the marathon majors this fall, but after another great Columbus experience I’m happy that things turned out the way they did.

There is definitely a sense of accomplishment that I feel for breaking 3 hours in the marathon but as of right now I don’t have any urge to lower that time. That hurt like hell and I can just imagine how bad a 2:50 would hurt…

I was really lucky to have Mary and Dave running the whole way with me and I think the three of us working together helped us all achieve our sub-3 finishes. I remember miles 14, 18, 23, 24, and 25 being really tough miles and it was nice to rely on someone else to set the pace through those miles. Congrats to Mary for finishing as the 7th female.

Is it just me or was the course once again significantly long? I know Garmins aren’t 100% accurate but my watch measured the course at 26.45 miles and all of my friends watches matched mine or showed that the course was a hair longer. If that’s the case than ¼ of a mile is a pretty big discrepancy, and would represent 1:45 at my pace (putting my time closer to 2:56:30). You would have a hard time convincing me that I lost that much distance by running an incorrect tangent. For people that were right on the verge of a Boston qualifier an extra ¼ mile might have detailed their bid. Just my two cents…

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