TL;DR: I ran the San Francisco marathon. It was my first one and I did it in 4:12:42. It hurt, but I liked it.
Race Plan and Pre-start
It was finally happening. After my previous failed attempt, I was really excited to finish a marathon this time and San Francisco sounded like a great race for my first one. I was having much more realistic expectations for this one. After all, I knew my training had been quite easier than it should have been and I was aiming for a finish in the 4:15-4:20-s. But definitely a finish. That roughly translated to a 5:30-5:45 min / km pace for the first 20-30 km, and a little above 6:00 after 30 km, which was uncharted territory for me.
Ok, that plan was partially a lie. At least it was the public version I was telling people who cared to ask. I knew that if the stars aligned I could maintain a pace of 5:30 or slightly faster for the first 25-30 km. Then, the distance after the cliff was unknown but anything around 6:00 was putting me near the 4h mark. So a sub-four finish could be a possibility -- that was my private optimistic plan. I was going to choose between the two as the race progressed.
Such thoughts were going through my head on the way to the Embarcadero for the start. I made it there around 5am with plenty of time before the start mostly due to Muni buses never following their schedule. It was much warmer than what I expected, so I was happy I didn't get a throwaway shirt. I randomly came across the Lee sisters who were in town just for the race and hung around with them before the start. I was trying to maintain conversation, but my mind was mostly on the race ahead, so might have come out as even less talkative than usual. Fast-forward to 5:50 am when the sun was just coming up and we were about to start.
Ok, that plan was partially a lie. At least it was the public version I was telling people who cared to ask. I knew that if the stars aligned I could maintain a pace of 5:30 or slightly faster for the first 25-30 km. Then, the distance after the cliff was unknown but anything around 6:00 was putting me near the 4h mark. So a sub-four finish could be a possibility -- that was my private optimistic plan. I was going to choose between the two as the race progressed.
Such thoughts were going through my head on the way to the Embarcadero for the start. I made it there around 5am with plenty of time before the start mostly due to Muni buses never following their schedule. It was much warmer than what I expected, so I was happy I didn't get a throwaway shirt. I randomly came across the Lee sisters who were in town just for the race and hung around with them before the start. I was trying to maintain conversation, but my mind was mostly on the race ahead, so might have come out as even less talkative than usual. Fast-forward to 5:50 am when the sun was just coming up and we were about to start.
0-10 km: Warm-up
If you're going to San Francisco,Yep, as cheesy as it is, this was the first song in my marathon playlist. And no, not the lousy 60s original, but the house remix from the mid-2000s. It felt a bit more appropriate to the whole running part. In any case, the race had just started and we were making our way north heading to Fisherman's Warf and the Presidio. It was an interesting experience to be able to run along the street that is usually quite traffic-heavy and also not to bump into the bajilion tourists usually in that area of town. For this part of the run, I had a fairly happy playlist that I'd used in most of my training back in Boston. I was genuinely enjoying myself, thinking how I'd setup my new place once I get back there for school. I wasn't as isolated from the world as I usually am once I start running, mostly because one of my headphones stopped working after the first few minutes.
be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.
Pacewise, during the first 2-3km I was mostly probing what felt comfortable after a week of extreme tapering (extreme as in no running at all). Those came out around 5:05 min / km (all km splits are in the chart in the end of this post), which was definitely too fast for what I was intending. I tried slowing down to 5:30, but kept doing 5:15-5:20-s instead, and eventually decided not to go against what felt right, gravitating around the 5:20 mark for quite a while. The two major hills that I knew of were in this part of the route, but no big drama there -- I just slowed down substantially and got over them. Which leads us to the 10 km mark, where the bridge begins.
10-20 km: Golden Gate Bridge and Pre-park
I wanted to start this part with a picture of Golden Gate Bridge covered in mist as usual. But until Google Glass comes out, I probably won't feel like stopping mid-run to whip out a phone and snap a picture. So, imagine coming to a bridge covered in fog. Or, better yet, look it up.I had mixed feelings about running on the bridge. On the one hand, it is one of the big attractions of this marathon, and a lot of people come to the race to be able to run on Golden Gate. And, on the other, it was like... running on a slippery bridge in the fog. The connectors between the different bridge segments were especially slippery and required some extra attention. At that point, the pace of the pack was starting to fall off, so I found myself weaving around the narrow lane trying to maintain my own pace. It was slightly discouraging to see tons of people getting back while I still hadn't reached the end, but oh well, they were running their own race and I was running mine.
I spent most of the time on the bridge people-watching, since it was the only chance to see runners face-to-face. There were a few friends that I didn't know were in the race, and quite a lot of people in Google t-shirts. Some even said "Google running", and I was wondering why I didn't have one -- after all I was at Google and I was running (in my defense, I'm an intern, free food and free swag makes the likes of me happy). The section between the bridge and the start of Golden Gate Park was relatively uneventful. There was a small hill right after the bridge end that I wasn't expecting, followed by a longish downhill section that was rather pleasant.
During this stretch, I was enjoying myself quite a lot, too. There were still no significant signs of fatigue and I was maintaining my average pace of 5:20 quite steadily. I was starting to make calculations in my head thinking that the optimistic plan might actually work out and I could be looking at a sub-four finish. If only I could maintain a 5:30 pace until 30 km and not fall off very dramatically after. Good thoughts.
20-30 km: Golden Gate Park
Nearing the park, the crowds started thickening. This was true especially inside the park itself, which everyone had described as quite a desolate section. But with the 1st half finish and the 2nd half start line, there were quite a lot of people. This was the point where random bands started appearing on the side, playing anything between gansta rap and heavy metal. I was paying attention to onlookers, but with more or less mixed feelings. I mean, it was definitely nice and encouraging to see banners and signs like: "Run, stranger, run" or "Chuck Norris never ran a marathon". But I was also getting a bit more bitter and thoughts like "what do you guys know" were not uncommon in my head. One of the aid stations at this part had beer in addition to water and electrolyte, and I spent a second hesitating if I should get some. Then I decided I actually wanted to finish.According to official timing that I saw later, I had hit the half mark at 1:55:36. I'm pretty sure that didn't coincide with my GPS, which was constantly extrapolating finish times between 3:42 and 3:53 h at this stage. I knew that didn't account for the pace drop-off later, but was still hoping for the sub-four finish. I very distinctly remember thinking: "Ok, fun time is over, now it's time for the real race". I switched my music style (I was planning on using the word "vibe" here, but some regular readers tell me I'm not cool enough for it, so "music style" it is) to some deeper trance / electronic so I didn't get distracted. But all I needed to do was to maintain my pace a few more kilometers until reaching 30 km.
The problem was, maintaining pace was getting harder and harder, especially in the second part of this stint. Part of it came from the fact that the park wasn't as flat as I'd expected. But mostly, I was just me getting tired. At the first signs of dragging my feet, I grabbed a gel at an aid station. This was my only calorie intake, other than the electrolyte drinks (I was grabbing one at every other aid station). The sugar rush felt nice for a short while, but in any case, the distance was starting to get me. Nothing special yet, no particular pain or anything, just generally feeling weak. Between 25-30 km my pace was dropping steadily, getting dangerously close to the 6:00 that I was supposed to hit a few km later. It seemed like ages were passing between the km-mark interruptions that my GPS was inserting in the playlist. My hopes for the sub-four time had already evaporated. I was questioning why on earth I was doing this. And even though I was very well aware of how much I wanted to finish, with every kilometer of missing my target time, the thought of just giving up was growing on me. In other words, I was slipping away.
30-42 km: Uncharted Territory (of pain)
Almost at 30 km, I was very close to stopping. I was just getting near the finish line of the 1st half (that course wasn't weaving as much through the park, so it coincided with the full race 30 km mark) and was extremely jealous of those halfers that were about to stop and be done. I very distinctly remember a corner before their final stretch, where I was just on the verge, but found new motivation.
(If you think the next part sounds lame, well, you have every right to do so. But, in that case, screw you, it got me through a really tough part of my race, and I think it carries an important moral.). So, the crowd had been getting even thicker near the half finish line, and I was getting increasingly annoyed because they weren't feeling my pain. Then, at that corner before the halfers' finish, I saw a little kid on the side. He probably wasn't older than 10, dressed in a hockey jersey or something. His parents were half a meter away, engaged in some deep adult conversation. Maybe about Angelina, or picking up the dry cleaning, who knows. The kid didn't care about that, he was watching the runners pass by with the awe only a kid could have. He was also pressing himself against the fence, stretching a small arm through to get a high-five from one of them. But he was standing at the corner and none of them would take the extra five meters to get near him. When I slapped his hand, I caught his glance for a split second. The mix of innocence, admiration and joy is hard to put down in words. But it was more than enough to get me thinking about the role models that I had when I was growing up. And how I would have felt if I knew they had just given up. So, if I was running to prove something to myself before, now it was for that kid. Because, whatever you do, you don't mess with a kid's aspirations. Period.
That episode did not last more than 5-6 seconds. Nevertheless, it got me through my mental, or "fatigue", issues. Everyone had been telling me how mental a sport long-distance running was, but this brief encounter was my first-hand realization of the fact. After this, I somehow knew I was going to finish unless my body gave in. If you look at my pace chart at bottom, you can see how I picked up the pace for kilometers 30 and 31. I was automagically energized again. The 4h pacers still hadn't passed by me, so I even revived my own sub-four aspirations. I mean, when they did pass me, I would just try to stick to their pace until the finish. Simple, right?
The only problem was, at 32 km my insufficient training started to show up. I had never done a run longer than 30 km before, and only a couple longer than 25 km. So, at 32 I started getting muscle spasms. My anatomy skills are far from decent, but I think the problematic muscles were in the calves area. They would just contract without me showing any indication that I want them to. It was definitely painful, but not enough to cause me to stop. The biggest issue was that the spasms were unexpected, and I could trip over if one was strong enough. The first ones were especially surprising, and I was very close to tripping then. At that state, if I had fallen, it would have been rather hard to get up again and keep going.
I needed to nurse this issue for the last 10 km. Every time I'd get a spasm, it would take 20-30 meters to recover my stride to something more closely resembling proper running. Going uphill would significantly increase the frequency to something close to once every 100 meters. Needless to say, my pace dropped and I was going significantly slower than 6:00. The 4h pacers passed by me somewhere between Haight and the Mission, but keeping up was out of the question. Very close to that spot, I was just about to get stopped so traffic can get through or something, when a guy in a Google1 shirt (official racing team) literally blazed past me and tore through the police line, screaming "Hold the traffic!". That was some dedication. But worked well for me since I didn't need to wait for traffic either.
After the Mission, what I was doing could barely be called running. Spasms were so frequent that I'd just almost recover from one before the next one hit. I stopped hearing my lap times after 38 km. Later I saw my GPS had ran out of battery (I guess it's time to chip in for a GPS watch, or to wait for Android battery life to get better, whichever happens first). Looking at my stats later, the 38 km mark was at 3:33:47, which means that for those last 4 km my pace was between 8:00 and 9:00. And that was pretty much it. I picked up pace in the last 500-600 meters before the finish, knowing that this time I was crossing the line. When I did cross it, the clock read 4:34. It took me a few minutes to realize this was time since the first wave started and I needed to subtract the 20 minutes until my own start. My official time was 4:12:42.
During the first few minutes after the finish, I was still high on adrenaline and not completely aware of what was going on. I started calling people until my phone completely died (if I didn't call you, blame HTC). A few minutes later, Dimitar, Manal and Rohit joined me after finishing their half (kudos) and we started sharing stories. The Lees found me a bit later, too, after finishing their second full race in two months (even more kudos). I didn't have a lot of time to linger, though -- academic me was calling and I had to catch a flight to LA to convince people why they really really need detailed x86 simulation. Oh well.
(If you think the next part sounds lame, well, you have every right to do so. But, in that case, screw you, it got me through a really tough part of my race, and I think it carries an important moral.). So, the crowd had been getting even thicker near the half finish line, and I was getting increasingly annoyed because they weren't feeling my pain. Then, at that corner before the halfers' finish, I saw a little kid on the side. He probably wasn't older than 10, dressed in a hockey jersey or something. His parents were half a meter away, engaged in some deep adult conversation. Maybe about Angelina, or picking up the dry cleaning, who knows. The kid didn't care about that, he was watching the runners pass by with the awe only a kid could have. He was also pressing himself against the fence, stretching a small arm through to get a high-five from one of them. But he was standing at the corner and none of them would take the extra five meters to get near him. When I slapped his hand, I caught his glance for a split second. The mix of innocence, admiration and joy is hard to put down in words. But it was more than enough to get me thinking about the role models that I had when I was growing up. And how I would have felt if I knew they had just given up. So, if I was running to prove something to myself before, now it was for that kid. Because, whatever you do, you don't mess with a kid's aspirations. Period.
That episode did not last more than 5-6 seconds. Nevertheless, it got me through my mental, or "fatigue", issues. Everyone had been telling me how mental a sport long-distance running was, but this brief encounter was my first-hand realization of the fact. After this, I somehow knew I was going to finish unless my body gave in. If you look at my pace chart at bottom, you can see how I picked up the pace for kilometers 30 and 31. I was automagically energized again. The 4h pacers still hadn't passed by me, so I even revived my own sub-four aspirations. I mean, when they did pass me, I would just try to stick to their pace until the finish. Simple, right?
The only problem was, at 32 km my insufficient training started to show up. I had never done a run longer than 30 km before, and only a couple longer than 25 km. So, at 32 I started getting muscle spasms. My anatomy skills are far from decent, but I think the problematic muscles were in the calves area. They would just contract without me showing any indication that I want them to. It was definitely painful, but not enough to cause me to stop. The biggest issue was that the spasms were unexpected, and I could trip over if one was strong enough. The first ones were especially surprising, and I was very close to tripping then. At that state, if I had fallen, it would have been rather hard to get up again and keep going.
I needed to nurse this issue for the last 10 km. Every time I'd get a spasm, it would take 20-30 meters to recover my stride to something more closely resembling proper running. Going uphill would significantly increase the frequency to something close to once every 100 meters. Needless to say, my pace dropped and I was going significantly slower than 6:00. The 4h pacers passed by me somewhere between Haight and the Mission, but keeping up was out of the question. Very close to that spot, I was just about to get stopped so traffic can get through or something, when a guy in a Google1 shirt (official racing team) literally blazed past me and tore through the police line, screaming "Hold the traffic!". That was some dedication. But worked well for me since I didn't need to wait for traffic either.
 |
| Not my best look. But oh well... I did happen to finish. |
After the Mission, what I was doing could barely be called running. Spasms were so frequent that I'd just almost recover from one before the next one hit. I stopped hearing my lap times after 38 km. Later I saw my GPS had ran out of battery (I guess it's time to chip in for a GPS watch, or to wait for Android battery life to get better, whichever happens first). Looking at my stats later, the 38 km mark was at 3:33:47, which means that for those last 4 km my pace was between 8:00 and 9:00. And that was pretty much it. I picked up pace in the last 500-600 meters before the finish, knowing that this time I was crossing the line. When I did cross it, the clock read 4:34. It took me a few minutes to realize this was time since the first wave started and I needed to subtract the 20 minutes until my own start. My official time was 4:12:42.
During the first few minutes after the finish, I was still high on adrenaline and not completely aware of what was going on. I started calling people until my phone completely died (if I didn't call you, blame HTC). A few minutes later, Dimitar, Manal and Rohit joined me after finishing their half (kudos) and we started sharing stories. The Lees found me a bit later, too, after finishing their second full race in two months (even more kudos). I didn't have a lot of time to linger, though -- academic me was calling and I had to catch a flight to LA to convince people why they really really need detailed x86 simulation. Oh well.
A conclusion of sorts
All in all, I was really happy to finish. I was slightly disappointed I didn't meet my optimistic sub-4h goal. But in all fairness, I wasn't prepared enough to do the race without any drama. The mental wall around 27 km and the physical one near 32-33 km really hit me hard. For improving on both fronts, more longer runs should definitely help. And it's maybe high time that I started a more regular training program for the next race. Which I should start picking very soon. Any East coast suggestions?
| Pace at every kilometer until the 38-th (where my GPS failed). |
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