For Whom the Dogs Bark

78F, 93% (77 DP), SSW 3 mph.  Ran a quick 4 this morning at GMP, 8:41 (138), 8:18 (151), 8:11 (156) and 8:10 (159).  4.06 miles in 33:50, 8:20/mile.  150 bpm average, 162 max.  Legs feel good today.  HR seems to be almost in the right zone, it might be even better if I get a boost from the weather this weekend.  It will come down to conditioning rather than heart rate -- that sounds a little off, but from experience I know that if my conditioning is good I can sustain higher heart rates for longer distances.  Current forecast for Hurley on Saturday morning is high 40s/low 50s, that can change quickly but at the moment I can hardly believe my luck.

79F, 89%, SSW 8 mph.  Still hot but no big deal at these distances.  1 mile WU then 3 x 1K:  7:27 (158), 7:17 (166) and 6:57 (174).  Overall 4.08 miles in 33:24, 154 bpm average, 182 max.  Trying to get apples to apples (or at least apples to pears):  Last Friday, the 2nd, 3rd and 4th repeats were 7:42 (159), 7:07 (169) and 7:06 (175), so today might be an improvement.

Some sobering realizations about the marathon course in Wisconsin.  Looked up a couple of comments about the course and people were complaining that it was a very challenging course.  Apparently it is mostly hills, which if true will not be good since starting and ending elevations are almost the same.  The course profile shows lots of bumps but it always does and I don't trust them anyway, they are usually wrong.

79F, 94% (77 DP), SSW 7 mph.  4.10 miles at GMP, 33:38 total, 8:13/mile.  8:29 (139), 8:13 (151), 8:05 (157) and 8:05 (160).  Heart rate climbing too fast, but I think that is a weather thing.  Felt like I could do 16 but not 26.  Banking hard on a big boost from the weather.

3-mile shakeout run with 5 sprints in the last mile to create lactated legs for carb loading.  But couldn't eat enough carbs to meet the standard, decided not to push it.  9:19 (129), 9:12 (137), 7:39 (157), 5:52 (170) for the stub.

Writing this on Friday night, at my motel in Ironwood, MI, across the river from Hurley, WI.  I have driven the majority of the course and I am worried.  Nothing jawdropping, but it's just that there is 26 miles of it.  I don't think a flat mile exists in the whole state.  The purpose of this race is to get a BQ -- otherwise it would be a lot of fun.  The scenery is beautiful, the people are nice and the weather is fantastic.  Maybe it won't be a big deal.  I ran bigger hills in Arizona, not well, but that was at altitude.  And the course from downtown Houston along the bayou that I ran 5 or 6 times in the afternoon heat is almost as hilly as this one, so there is a sliver of hope.  Maybe the thick cool air will save me.

Temperature at race time is forecast at 51F, climbing to 66F by the finish.  Dew point right now is 48F, compared to 72F in Houston.  At least I achieved my weather goal by coming here.

Well, it was an interesting day.  Didn’t get a BQ, but I think it was due to factors beyond my control, couldn’t really have done anything more.  The course was a monster and it actually got too hot at the end, up there in the north woods.  But I had fun.  There are thousands of lakes up there, and I may have talked my wife into getting property somewhere in the Upper Peninsula.

This is a small marathon, but that is deceiving, it is an important event for this region.  It is a venerable race, this was its 45th running, not many races can say that.  It was organized but not well-organized, no feel of large marathon professionalism, which was OK of course.  I got to the registration desk late Friday afternoon and they had me registered for the half, even though my form was in the marathon book.  They said they would fix it but they were also like, “dang, there’s another one”.  I wasn’t super confident but decided that the race was small enough I could get it fixed if I somehow managed to qualify.  By this time I had driven portions of the course and I knew that goal was receding into the sunset, so I decided that would be a happy problem to have if somehow they didn’t give me an official qualifying time.

In keeping with the theme, there was quite a debate about bus pickup times.  The website said 5:15, the local newspaper said 6:00, and a sheet handed out at the registration desk said 6:15.  I decided to go with that but went a little bit early just in case I was wrong.  I could drive to the start and figure out later how to retrieve my car.  But I guessed right.  It was me and a bunch of friendly, old local guys on the first bus -- the crowd that wakes up at 2:00 ready for the day.  The bus was literally 2/3 full of old men with heavy Scandinavian accents (mostly Finns and Norwegians, as far as I could tell), have never seen anything like it.  They were having a grand old time, curious about what brought me up there.  It got raucous when I said I came up there for the weather; apparently this marathon is known around there for being hot, humid and miserable.  One guy had a long, thin gray goatee and a do-rag -- he said that just proves you can never trust anything on Google.  He was also pretty fired up about the price of Grandma’s Marathon, said next time I should come run his, which is free, including a t-shirt, chip timing and a certified course.  He did say his was “small, not like this one”.  These guys are the reason I finished 6th in my age group, which you would think would be impossible for a race that had about 200 total individual runners.

Another unique thing about this race was all the relay teams.  They were running 5-mile legs and the town turned out in force -- I think there were almost as many relay teams as individual runners.  One of the teams had about 10 runners in it (not sure how, maybe there were two teams).  They showed up somewhat inebriated and started doing drills and chants like a football team warming up.  One guy’s running outfit was cut-off jeans and basketball shoes -- no shirt.  He was practicing his starting block technique.

Starting temperature was about 50F, but the sun was already up at 7:30 when they started -- not sure why they don’t just start an hour early, but I think they consider 10:00 too early to drink beer.  I tried to go very relaxed the first mile but it came in right at 8:15, my goal pace.  The next two were a little slower, but it was difficult to maintain an even pace due to the very uneven course.  I read somewhere that there was a total of 1,800 feet of climbing, though the finish line was only 3’ higher than the start line.  They had mats every 5 miles, but not at the start line -- gun times only.  At about mile 3 I fell in with a 51-year old guy from the Detroit area who was running his 14th marathon, but his last one was 1997, so he had no idea what he was doing.  Our paces seemed similar, so we decided to work together.  We ran all the way to about mile 19 before he fell off pace.  By about mile 20 I still had an 8:17 - 8:20 cumulative pace going, but went up a big hill and my legs failed to recover for the first time, at which point I knew it was over.  Did the 10K death march and ended up walking part of the last hill in mile 26, which was the longest and steepest of the course.  Finished in 3:46:59, but because of no starting mat my posted time (whenever they get around to it) is going to be the gun time, 3:47:04. 

Here are my splits, reliable heart rate readout kicking in after two miles:  (1) 8:15; (2) 8:33; (3) 8:24 (158); (4) 7:56 (159); (5) 8:04 (158); (6) 8:34 (160); (7) 8:22 (161); (8) 8:33 (162); (9) 8:16 (162); (10) 8:14 (162); 8:13 (160); (12) 8:23 (160); (13) 8:05 (160); (14) 8:24 (167); (15) 8:08 (166); (16) 8:17 (165); (17) 8:22 (163); (18) 8:24 (166); (19) 8:27 (166); (20) 8:30 (170); (21) 8:46 (168); (22) 8:38 (168); (23) 8:41 (168); (24) 9:32 (164); (25) 9:55 (158); (26) 12:19 (149) and (26.28 by Garmin measurement) 2:45 (9:58 pace) (149).

Low 70s at the end, but I never got an official temperature/humidity reading.  My heart rate was never bad, which I attribute to running down here all summer.  It was actually lower than when I ran my first BQ in Richmond 3 years ago.  When HR goes down at the end of the race, that means “bonk”, pure and simple, very easy to interpret that particular biofeedback indicator.  But I believe that my bonk for the last 3 miles despite a lower overall heart rate means I haven’t come all the way back yet.  The day I ran my PR (SGM 2011) I averaged 169 for the race.  Today was 163 (disregarding the bonked miles).  And the hills used up precious glycogen, which I think may be a different metric than heart rate.  It all added up, but I didn’t run poorly, I did slightly better than in January on a flat cold course.  Today I just wasn’t quite ready, probably would not have made 3:35 even on a flat course, though I would have been much closer.  On to St. George, my first qualifying race for 2015, when my BQ switches to 3:55, I’m embarrassed to say.