2010 Philadephia Marathon

It was bound to happen sooner or later. 2010 has been a good ride so far: lots of new PR’s, age placements, a BQ. Sooner or later a bad day was going to catch up to me. Sunday was that day.

It started on Saturday; I felt “off”. Something didn’t feel right and I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was. Lunch didn’t sit too well inside my stomach and my friend, Maureen, said that perhaps I still had remnants of Thursday’s stomach bug in me. I felt tired. I took a nap as soon as I checked into the hotel in the afternoon. I didn’t have an appetite for dinner on Saturday either.

Sunday morning I couldn’t stomach the coffee which is completely abnormal, despite how bad the coffee actually is. I drank it and had my two waffles plenty early enough for it to begin to digest before the race. We headed over to the starting line (my three running friends and I) and everything was timed perfectly: shed layers, check bags, port-a-john, line up in corral. I found a group of local friends in front of the 3:30 pacer in the corral and waited for the race to start. I was in the 2nd corral this year which was a great corral to be in. The crowd was much thinner in this wave than in the one behind us, which was where I was last year.

We started and as usual it took a the first 3 miles for the crowd to thin out but a lot of this is attributed to the narrow streets of Old City. The woman I was running with had a hard time staying slow so I let her go, pulling her back every now and then. I tried not to waste my breath calling out to her and to stay focused on my own race.

My loose plan was to start with an 8:05 first mile and keep the rest of the first 5 miles at 8:00 pace. Then, I would knock the pace down by 5 seconds for each 5 mile block. So, 8:00-7:55-7:50-7:45-7:40 and then do whatever I could handle for the rest. Actually, those 7:40′s were wishful thinking, I’d take whatever I could get.

Five mile split goals:

5 – 0:40:00
10 – 1:19:00
15 – 1:58:00
20 – 2:36:00
25 – 3:16:00

In the first 12 miles of the race I didn’t trust anything my watch was telling me. I had the auto lap feature turned off so that I could use the Garmin as a chronograph and I’d hit the split button at each mile marker. The lap pace would show the pace as one thing and then when I hit the split button, my split time would show up as completely different. For example, lap pace during a certain mile might show as 7:35 but the split would register as 8:05. I had no idea which was right so I focused more on breathing and how I was feeling instead of the clocks or my watch. I had my 5 mile splits on my arm and that was all that I really bothered with.

I hit mile 5 in 39:01 which meant I had 1 minute in the bank. Overall I felt okay but my legs felt a bit heavy. I knew this was not a good sign and just hoped I could hold on. There was no panic, but I had a feeling of “uh-oh”.

The “hill” or overpass as we headed into University City felt much harder than it should have. This was a mere speed bump compared to the roads where I train and should not have been a big deal. Yet, I noticed it and tried to shrug it off. Mile 9 past Drexel was horrible. It did not feel good. Mile 10 split was 1:18:00, still 1 minute in the bank.

I have never liked the West River Drive portion of this race. The sun is directly in your eyes, you start to feel warm, the crowds are practically non-existent and it’s a really ugly part of the course. You’re on this section for almost 2 miles and it seems to go on forever. I held a pretty consistent pace of 7:50-7:55 along this section. I was glad to see the Art Museum again, running through the half way point in 1:42:xx. I felt heavy and I really wanted to pull off with the half marathoners. I actually considered it. And then I told myself that I had to see this thing through. That right there is a pretty good indicator as to how this race was going for me because I should not have been feeling that bad at the half way point.

I hit mile 15 in 1:57:59. I lost my minute that I had in the bank and now I would have to work to finish within my goal time. And I was feeling bad. My legs were hurting. My breathing was fine, it was easy. But my legs … they were in bad shape. The next 11 miles were going to be rough.

This year’s change of course added a bridge crossing at mile 17. I knew that this was going to be tough and it was! This was the second of 3 turnarounds in the race. I could have definitely done without this and I’m sure a lot of others felt the same way. It’s not easy to pivot 360° around a corner, nor is it very fun to run up the road grade, over a bridge, down the road grade, around a hairpin turn, back up, across the bridge and then down.

After that we head into Manayunk.

Manayunk. Rollers. Not fun and I am losing steam. I look up and see my friend Randy Latza. I forgot he was going to be there and though I was hurting it felt so good to see him there. He asked how I was and I said “okay”. A mile further I find another friend, Mark Will-Weber. He’s so awesome, we slap hands and I head to the final hairpin turnaround. Mile 20. I want to walk. 2:39:16. I have lost 3 minutes. The 3:30 pace group passes me and I have not one ounce of energy to try to get in front of them or even to run with them.

I kiss my goal time goodbye. Strangely, I’m okay with it. I knew the first half of my race was too fast, it caught up with me in the second half. I felt like shit. I tried, and I messed up. I was so lax with my training, my easy runs were slower than I had run them in the past. If I were to do this again I would certainly speed those back up. It helps on race day. I knew I’d still at the very least get a BQ out of today’s effort and that is my overall goal with the marathon: to be able to say I have Boston Qualified in every marathon I’ve run. I have one more marathon, Boston, and then I am done.

It’s amazing the thoughts that flood your brain at any given point in time.

I run past Mark again and hear him cheering me on from the other side of the street. I don’t even look over this time because I am feeling defeated and don’t want to look up. Then there’s Randy, he comes over and runs alongside of me, asks me how I’m feeling. I tell him I just lost my goal time to which he says don’t give up, I’m running about a 1:31:xx pace. For a moment that helps because it means I can still PR. A half a mile later I stop to stretch. Screw it.

I pick it up again and see someone ahead, walking. It’s Shawn Scherr, a friend from kickrunners. I have never met Shawn in person and how the heck I knew it was him from behind is beyond me. As I approach him I look over and say “Shawn”. He recognizes me instantly and I stop to walk with him. He fell off the 3:10 pace group and was walking it in. It wasn’t his day, he said. He continues to talk about how he felt so confident going into this and it just wasn’t his day. I start cursing this damn race and saying how glad I am that it is my last, besides Boston, but that’s just to run it. Not race it. I’m tired of attempting to race a marathon. It’s pure craziness.

We start to run again but not far into that Shawn stops. I tell him I’ll see him at the finish line and continue on. 4 more miles. How will I ever get there? It seems like a million miles away to me. I walk two more times before I get to mile 25. I am so defeated and my legs hurt. All this time I am thinking about my first ultra coming up in March. I’m thinking, “that is going to feel so much easier than this.” Sure, it’s a little further, but I’m not going to be out there trying to race. I’m going out to have fun. What a difference and today seals my feelings about switching to trails.

Mile 25, 3:25:37. That was my #1 goal for today, to finish the marathon in 3:25. I still have over one more mile to go. This sucks.

For brief second I think if I pick it up now, I can run it in hard and still get a PR. Yea, right. That ain’t gonna happen.

I see Maria off to the right in her bright orange. It was so good to see her and I just roll my eyes as if to say “not my day.”

The crowds in the last mile are so amazing. It is so loud and it seems like everyone is reading my name off my bib and yelling it to me. “You look great!”, “You’re almost there!”, “You’ve got it Jill!” The entire time I am so pissed off because I am so far off my pace. Whatever.

So, here’s the one highlight I have which couldn’t have come at a better time. At the finish line the street sort of opens up and I’m running toward the finish with no one around me. I hear Bart [Yasso] talking over the loudspeaker and then I see him just before the finish line. Now, you see, Bart and I are in the local running club together so I get to spend Friday nights at the clubhouse with him and the other club members at our weekly happy hour. I’ve gotten to know Bart over the past 6-8 months when he’s not traveling around the country MCing races. I stick out my hand and he high fives me and then as I’m passing through the timing mats I hear him say over the loudspeaker, “Lehigh Valley Running Scene’s Jill Forsythe just got a BQ”. Thank you Bart. You have no idea how great it was to see a friend as I crossed through the finish line.

This was race #12 for the year and I am officially tired. I stated above that I am done with the marathon. I can not guarantee that I will never run another in my lifetime because honestly, there may come a day when I decide to do another one. Or perhaps I’ll run a destination marathon. My friend and I are talking about doing one out west in CA wine country, or perhaps even Wineglass. Or … if my husband ever decides to run one (he’s expressed interest in both NYC and Great Wall) I would definitely do that with him. However, I am putting this marathon thing on the shelf for a while and focusing on trail running and ultras as well as the half marathon distance and under.

While I did not get the PR I was hoping for, I did BQ.

Official time: 3:36:47 (8:17 avg pace)
Overall: 1800/8925 (20.2%)
Gender: 360/3755 (9.6%)
Age group 40-44: 38/503 (7.6%)
Age Grade: 66.2%

Now I will share with you my splits. My very ugly splits. This is a reverse progression run, the total opposite of what I was hoping to achieve.

mileage – split time [split pace]
m1 – 1.04 – 8:09 [7:50]
m2 – 1.06 – 7:55 [7:28]
m3 – 1.07 – 8:15 [7:42]
m4 – 0.94 – 7:03 [7:30]
m5 – 1.00 – 7:37 [7:37]
m6 – 1.08 – 7:41 [7:07]
m7&8 – 2.03 – 15:28 [7:38]
m9 – 1.04 – 7:58 [7:40]
m10&11 – 2.02 – 15:57 [7:53]
m12 – 1.01 -7:54 -[7:49]
m13 – 1.01 – 8:03 [8:00]
m14 – 1.00 – 7:50 [7:49]
m15 – 1.01 – 8:04 [7:49]
m16 – 1.01 – 8:10 [8:07]
m17 – 0.99 – 8:08 [8:13]
m18 – 1.00 – 8:11 [8:13]
m19 – 1.00 – 8:18 [8:17]
m20 – 1.01 – 8:28 [8:26]
m21 – 1.01 – 8:42 [8:38]
m22 – 1.01 – 8:54 [8:49]
m23 – 1.01 – 9:43 [9:38]
m24 – 1.01 – 9:14 [9:10]
m25 – 1.02 – 9:46 [9:34]
m26.2 – 1.24 – 11:13 [9:03]