Mission. Accomplished: 9th Marathon Finished
I hereby report success in finishing my 9th marathon (and the last long race of the year before the customary "47km for 47 years", which is a personal race I'm doing every year - basically, for my birthday, I'm running my age).
The main goal of all my races is: zero damage. This goal was met beautifully today. After I realized I wont' be able to meet my time goal, I went very conservatively and I literally have no damage, not even minor muscle pain.
The time goal, though, as you guessed, was badly damaged. I started too fast for my level of training and although I had a good first half, with around 1:57 for the first semi, I bonked hard. I alternated walking and running for a while and then I was able to run comfortably from km 35 onward and finished in just under 5 hours.
The stress that I was talking about in the 48 hours race report it's still taking its toll and I came to terms with that. That's how things are right now and that's that. I feel very relaxed and I truly enjoyed the race, we had a beautiful weather: sunny, but not too hot, not too cold and not a drop of rain.
Now, back to work :)
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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Nicely done! Regardless of the time you run, completing a marathon is a great accomplishment.
It's easy to start off too fast in a long race like that. I've only run 3 marathons in which I've maintained about the same pace for the entire race. I usually fall apart to some degree the last 1/4 of the race.
Glad to hear you stayed damage free. That can be a difficult thing to do in distance running.
Congrats for your marathons and for keeping the pace. I can maintain pace for hours in the 6-7 minute per kilometer interval, but once below that mark, I bonk. I need more speed training, I guess. Also, staying damage free is a practice that I learned the hard way. My goal for every race if "damage zero" first, and then time (or distance).
Well done, how long have you been a runner for? I just started
I ran my first marathon at 42, not I'm close to 47. How old are you?
I'm 21. Great to hear man, keep up the good work
Congrats on finishing. Sorry you didn't make your sub 4 hours though.
Thanks :)
Aww, that's nice of you, but I'm not a very competitive runner. Also, my speed training was quasi-inexistent.
Congratulations! Maximum that I've run have been 10km at once :)
Congratulations mister!!! Targets achieved, this is the most important. Well done!
Thank you, really appreciate it :)
Finishing the race with no damage is awesome. Ive started working out again and that is also priority #1 for me.
realy super post i like it
Good
Congrats, well done!
I forced my way though my first marathon creating an iliotibial band syndrome injury that keep me running for over a month. I fortunately found a stretch that actually helped the muscles supporting the band.
My next marathon was good as I had trained in the gym while building a core of strength using guidance from exercise training professionals.
As you mentioned speed training my last two marathons were run with less than 20 miles of training per week. By now I was really used to listening to my body and my workouts consisted of being 4 miles each, with stretches of hills. 2 of the runs were run at 5% below my 10k racing pace and the other 2 consisted of adding all out fartlecs lasting a minute with a 5 minute jog and build recovery between sprints.
I found that the last marathons were my easiest and I was less spent after the race.
One nice thing about starting a race a bit slower than you feel you should go is the number of runners that you pick off through the rest of the race due to them breaking down. I learned that from triathlete Scott Tinley.
good for you, congrats!