50 milers should come with a warning, it’s a world apart from the 50k and marathon distances. Back of the pack is a tough situation...it’s not even about a bad time, you might not finish the race - a DNF. Somehow you have to dig deeper than ever before to find the strength to keep going. Ultra-marathons are definitely 100% mental. I saw the 50 milers go off, volunteered till 2 pm, saw my friends come in and then cheered the last finishers. I decided to take some pictures in hopes of capturing some of the emotions at the finish line.
Link to the photos: https://flic.kr/s/aHsmjgjKUC
Tuesday, May 8, 2018
Wednesday, May 2, 2018
NJ marathon 2018
The NJ marathon was my 22nd marathon, my 4th marathon this year and my season A race!
The training
I started training for this race the holiday week 2017 (around Christmas). I started off with 5 weeks of base building, slowly ramping up my mileage. I focused a lot on cross training (swimming, bouldering) at this time. February I added strength training 3x and a core focused bootcamp 1x a week. Then I had about 5 weeks of race (2 marathons + 1 ultra) where cross training went to zero and strength training to 1-2x a week. I had about 6 weeks after the Georgia marathon to train solely for NJ and I wanted to focus on speed but I jumped into training too soon and got a strain. I ignored it at first and continued on but the pain got worse to where it hurt while walking so I went into a 4 week taper (instead of the 2 weeks as I originally planned). I cut my miles by half and skipped a few key workouts. I spent a little more time on swimming and got back to strength training 2x a week. I got to race day with plenty of rest and recovery but not feeling super confident because of the missed workouts. I usually do short one week taper so two weeks was already a lot for me but 4 weeks! :/. The week of the race I ate more salads and greens, two days before I started eating more carbs.
The Day before
After a longer than expected drive (huge traffic different between leaving at 9 am and 10 am!), I made it to the expo with Francis and Neena. Met Cathy + Nate inside the expo and met Rene on his way out. I ended up talking to Rene for a while. I took some notes since he was aiming for 2:50-2:55 marathon =O. One thing I found important was his reminder to hydrate properly the day before, something with the traveling I was forgetting to do.
The expo was super small…even smaller than Atlanta and I got through it in less than 5 minutes. No freebees but they had a cool photo print station. Afterwards we did a shakeout run! The shakeout run the day before a marathon is something I got from QDR. I chose to jog on the beach barefoot for 30 minutes; it gave me a chance to enjoy the beach while I was still in the mood. I was pretty sure that after the marathon the beach would be far from my mind. I only did 2.5 miles in the thirty minutes but that’s okay, it was never the miles that mattered but time on my feet. I also thought of the run as form work (as it been getting warmer I been doing a few short runs barefoot on grass as well). Next was lunch where I got to walk around Long Branch and check the town out briefly before an early dinner on the way back (I drove back to Queens for the night). I got to check out two vegan spots – Karma café and Vegan tree.
Once at home I found my blue sharpie in my archery bag (backup for initialing arrows) and wrote "This is what you came for" on my arm with an arrow pointing forward. I wrote this as my mantra, I chose to come here to push myself to the breaking point - I'm here to dig deeper and find the strength to break through it. It also reminds me that I'm here because I love it. I focused a lot on the love I have received over the years through running. From struggling to just jog a mile without stopping 5.5 years to learning what taper is two days before my first marathon to surviving a 100 miler to my PR streaks of today. It has been a crazy journey and I'm grateful for all the support I have received over the years. I been last place or near last place in quite a lot of races and I'm finally at a place where I’m getting a lot better (still baby steps).
I also prepared a running playlist. Like the Georgia marathon I was planning to listen to music for miles 10-20. In Atlanta I had the two songs that the iphone came with and just hated it. This time I brought jaybird Run true wireless which allows me to play music on one ear (with one ear piece). I also choose songs that people have recommended to me in the past for running. I'm not much of a music fan but listening to those songs reminded me of the person who recommended it. Then my laptop itunes wasn't syncing with my iphone so I had to transfer to dropbox and find an app that could play a playlist off dropbox. I ended up with 4 hours of sleep.
The internal focus the night before gave me the confidence to aim for 3:30. The week before, I debated what time to aim for. I felt that 3:40 was a safe bet, 3:35 was mostly likely doable and that 3:30 was a bit crazy. It adds up to just 12-13 seconds per mile but that add up to a lot over 26.2 miles.
Pre race
I arrived at the race parking lot at about 6 am, took maybe 5 minutes to park. I like coming to the race 90 minutes early if I'm not staying within walking distance to the race. It took me another 10 minutes to gather my stuff; I almost forgot my running shoes! I had plenty of time to go to a real bathroom with a small line (waited like 5 minutes), met Jeff and Gabe, take team photos, do a 5 minute shakeout run (a habit I picked up from Julie during the NOLA marathon), take shelter from the rain with more hanging out, eat a waffle cookie and my gel and get close to the start of my corral. I definitely didn't need any stress of rushing to the start line; the marathon is 100% mental!
Miles 1-10
I broke off the race to three sections. I would stick to the 3:30 pace group for the first 10 miles. Then I would cruise the next 10 miles with the help of music and then struggle though the real start of the race during the last 10k. I started the race with Rinchen so we were close to the 3:20 pace group. I had to back off slightly to allow the 3:30 to catch up. They ended up passing by too quickly. I struggled with the pace immediately, it felt more like a half marathon pace but I decided to hang on. I also started chafing immediately, I'm not sure why but I just ignored it. I found two Dashing Whippets and a Van Cortlandt runner going at 3:30 so I paced with them till mile 4 where I lost them. As I approach mile 4 I was ready to eat my first gel but I decided to see if adjusting my shorts would fix the chafing problem which lead to me dropping the gel. Did not stop to pick it up. I usually take a gel 15 minutes before, first gel at mile 4 and then gels about every 3 miles till mile 20. Then I switch over to drinking Gatorade. This race I also ate a waffle cookie before the race because I felt hungry. I guess my two bananas with chocolate 3 hours beforehand weren't cutting it. I was able to keep the 3:30 within sight for this time. Around mile 9 my feet started feeling sore. I had decided to wear my minimalist Topo shoes instead of my 800+ miles wore out Brooks’s shoes mostly because the Brooks shoes had holes in them and it was raining. I knew my feet would get sore but this was a bit early.
Mile 10-20
I was struggling at mile 10 but this is where I would use music! Except that I have no idea how to turn on my earpiece. At mile 11 I even tried looking it up on my phone but got general directions. After fumbling for a bit I decided to just put the jaybird in my right ear and I got it to work at mile 12. I like this setup - being able to listen to music in one ear but with the other ear open I am able to hear everything around me. Mostly the cheers that spectaculars are giving! A runner passes gives me a double high five and then runs on (she had quite the energy). A man says go Queens, best borough to which I cheer at but then he continues and says next to Brooklyn to which I make a face. My strategy was to get through the struggle of pace was by distracting myself. I feed off the energy of spectaculars, swung my arms in dancing motions to some of the songs. I probably was wasting energy but it kept me distracted. Also around mile 10 Kathryn caught up and we run around each other for 3ish miles and then miles 13-15 together before she passed by. At mile 15 I almost caught up to the 3:30 pace group too. At miles 18 and 19 I saw Kathryn and Rinchen at the turnarounds which gave me a boost. Around mile 20 I saw Francis and Cathy for another boost! The turnaround was good mentally for this.
Miles 20 to 26.2
I lost sight of the 3:30 pace group and at this point I was slowing down. It didn't feel like the wall, it kind of felt like I mentally faded. I used mantras and then aimed for the buildings as targets to run strong to and then set another target. Step by step. I caught up to Nate who was also going for 3:30, I wish I saw him earlier and got a chance to work together with him towards our goals. He was struggling at this point. A team in training coach just started running with him and I guess was going to give him some pep talk. The coach told me the course is all downhill from here and I joked that's what I been telling myself. A runner says there is only 4.5 miles at which I dread thinking about. At around mile 22 I see Kenny which gives a big boost. The miles here were pretty empty of people so it was a bit rough mentally, the boost from music had long wore out and my midfoot felt like they had been burnt. At mile 24, feeling the end of the run I started picking it up again. Also there was more of a crowd which helped. At 24.8ish, the ground became a smooth broadwalk and I was able to glide through (much to the happiness of my feet). I run the last mile strong but just 10 feet or so shy from the finish I get a sudden cramp on my right hamstring. It was so painful that it stopped my run and had me hop over the last few steps. Not a great finishing pic :/.
I struggled to walk with the cramp and volunteers asked if I needed help but I figure I just needed some electrolytes. The cramp went away and I immediately caught up with Rinchen, Rene, and Kathryn. They had some awesome finishing times. I got my drop bag and went to the changing tent. Realized I couldn’t pull my clothes on without holding on to something and then I met Mike. I met him before in the easy run with Scott Jurek during his book event. He offered me a seat and we caught up briefly. Air relax boot massage with Cathy and Nate and lunch with some QDR people to end my NJ marathon experience.
Friday, March 23, 2018
Georgia marathon
The Georgia marathon was my 21st marathon! It was my third marathon of 2018, just two
weeks after the New Orleans marathon! It was my hilliest road marathon with 1534
feet of gain (hilliest trail marathon is still the Breakneck Point marathon
with 10000 feet of gain). The course was
scenic and the crowds were awesome! I
felt a lot of love throughout the course and I’ll remember it as one my
favorite races.
Recovery
Important to this race was to recover from the New Orleans
marathon two weeks before. I took two
days off and then ended up running almost 12 miles which was too much. So I took another two days off. I hiked the Saturday and did one strength
training session with a few boulder sessions.
Kept myself active but didn’t run too much. I only did 17 miles that recovery week. The week of the race the focus were on a
medium slow run (7 miles) to regain some aerobic fitness on Tuesday and a track
workout to practice running fast under some stress (2x2 miles after running 4
200s and then 2x400) on Thursday. Special
thanks to Kelvin for leading that workout and the rest of the queens distance
runners for the company!
Shakeout! – Day before race
I wanted to start my weekend in Georgia off with a sunrise
from a mountain. Found out that many
state park s open at 7 am so had to go to a national forest. In my search I found that Springer Mountain,
the southern terminus of the AT trail was only two hours away. Despite it being cloudy and zero chance of
sunrise I decided to drive up and do a morning trail run up and down the
mountain. Springer Mountain doesn’t have
the best view either but it was more of a symbolic trip. Shortest route is 2 miles and longest is
about 10 miles and I found one that was 4 miles. Perfect for a shakeout run!
After shakeout, it was a 2 hour drive back to eat lunch at
Udipi Café in Duluth (NE of Atlanta) for some south Indian food. Then to the expo center at the Hyatt Regency Atlanta. It was a tiny expo which made packet
pickup quick. Then the aquarium, 50% off
with a promo code from the virtual goodie bag of the race. The aquarium was similar to the NASA museum
in Houston where they are focusing more on experiences rather than simply
showing items. I wanted to do dinner at
Herban Fix but there was a 40 minute wait so dinner at mellow mushrooms. I ended up eating a 14” pizza slice which was
a fairly heavy dinner; something I don’t normally do (underestimated how big
the pizza was). Afterwards I did a scout
of the starting/finishing area.
Race morning!
Six hours of sleep,
a cliff bar mint chocolate bar that had some caffeine in it and a banana to get
me to the starting line. It took longer
than I thought to get ready and I got in a 3 minute warmup jog instead of 5
minutes before heading to my corral. I
moved myself a little behind 3:45 pace group.
I planned to run with them for as long as I could.
The entire race is
pretty much either uphill or downhill. I
know people always seek flat courses but I find hills to be mentally
easier. For the uphill I breathe in my
nose and out my mouth and then was the downhill I breathe in and out my nose
and focus on relaxing my breathing a bit.
You could always see the top of the hill on roads so while uphills are
slowing you down you know you only have to stick at it for 2-3 minutes and then
you got a nice downhill to enjoy. The
course is fairly scenic, a lot of beautiful green even in March! The temperature started at 55 and climbed to
66 but it was fairly cloudy so I felt like it was near perfect. I was afraid of getting hot so I sipped half
a cup of water and threw the rest on my head at every water station. There is also a half marathon and the course
felt pretty crowded for the first 7 miles where the half marathoners split off. They did do a good job separating the two
races in the end though (otherwise I would have bumped into the walkers of the half
near the end). The course is also not
completely closed to traffic and I saw one or two instances where a runner had
to stop because a car was going through.
There was also food on the course!
I ate three half oranges and a half of a banana. Fruit always feels better than gels. They also had pretzels at one station and the
volunteers were singing a rhyme for them (which I found cute) but I didn’t take
any. I used my usual gel strategy of one
gel pre-race and then one at mile 4, afterwards one every 3 miles till mile 19.
I found parking
within a 5 minute walk to the finish and about 10 minutes to the start line
fairly easy (even with my truck). A 7 am
start in March after daylight savings starts means that you start the marathon in
the dark but you get a glimpse of sunrise!
I was in corral B which went off 3-4 minutes after corral A. I immediately lost the 3:45 group getting to
the start line; I should have positioned myself right behind them. I tried to go in with the same mentality as
New Orleans where I wouldn’t look at my watch but I found myself looking at my
pace most miles. I didn’t do any
calculations about end time or total pace; I guess I was just curious if I was
keeping up.
1-7
The start of the
race felt pretty crowded. That’s usually
normal but I found myself weaving through more often than I’m use to. The course starts of at a slight downhill with
a few bumps for 3ish miles and then a short hill. Mile 4 goes through historic MLK site.
7 – 16
After mile 7 the
course really cleared up with the half marathoners gone. I could now see the 3:45 pace group ahead of
me, maybe .2 miles ahead. I would have
loved to do a surge to catch up but too risky.
There were a lot of people here cheering. A volunteer or member of the Atlanta track
club rode by several times and gave tips multiple times. It really helped out. Mile 15 I particularly remember feeling a lot
of love from the crowds. Going through
Decatur there were signs giving messages in sequence order. Like a poem and “keep going” which kept me
pretty entertained.
Miles 16 to 22
Hit the druid hills
and there was a lot of uphills with the steepest uphills being around mile
20. I originally planned to try
something I haven’t tried since my second marathon, listen to music! I was going to put headphones at mile 12 but
I felt so good that I finally decided to put them on at mile 16. I hated it and by mile 20 I took them off. I was still feeling great at this point but I
was slowing down (and I knew it). I saw
the 3:45 pace group at mile 24 at a short out and back, about 3 minutes ahead
of me.
Miles 22 to 26.2
Now back closer to
downtown. As my feet started hurting I
started to struggle on the uphills around mile 23. At mile 25 a marathon manic started talking
to me. It was her 31st
marathon and she was trying to do under 4 hours for all 50 states. We talked a bit about 50 states and then she
told me I had a bit more of a go. With
that I sped up a bit to the finish. I
kind of needed someone to tell me I still have a bit more go left.
There was much
afterwards after the finish line besides your standard banana, pretzels and
granola bars but I enjoyed the journey!
Tuesday, March 6, 2018
20th marathon - Rock and Roll NOLA
The Rock and Roll New Orleans was my 6th race this year and my 6th PR, beating my marathon PR set only 6 week before! Conditions were fairly bad for me but through mediation I made it to mile 18 without too much of a struggle. The next six miles were a struggle and then my toes started hurting causing the last two to be pure suffering.
Preconditions: The biggest factor going to this race was that I ran a hard ultra 8 days before this race. I ran the Mount Mitchell challenge, a 36ish mile race with 4,324 feet of elevation gain and my legs were still sore going into this race. I also moved (across the street to anyone curious) midweek which took time away from some recovery swims and workouts. I did manage to get in some easy pre-lunch runs and a shakeout run the day before. The day of my flight we got hit by a noreaster which caused my flight to be cancelled and I got rebooked the following day arriving at NOLA at 6 pm. The expo ended at 5 pm so I would have missed bib pickup. It was a stressful morning. I wasn’t able to find any earlier options but Rock and roll allowed me to do bib pickup on race day. Having the day before to relax and walk around the city would have been great instead of traveling but guess this happens once in a while.
On the same flight to New Orleans I met Kieran who ran the QDR long run #2 in Alley Pond park a few weeks ago. He also ran the Houston marathon as well and signed up for this race 2 weeks ago. We talked for a bit and got a uber into the city. Then I was off to the hotel and met up with teamate Julie. Special thanks to Julie for dealing with the hotel booking issue, getting vegan pizza, granola, hammer and vega protein bars, and even a sandwich for tomorrow morning (that's dinner, breakfast and post race recovery covered)! The race site was a 5 minutes walk from the hotel and we did a practice commute to race start. Early to sleep afterwards. Got 7ish hours. Unfortunately heard a lot of in and other from neighbors through the night so I woke often. Still felt pretty rested going into the race.
I ate a little bit of granola and a peanut butter sandwich for breakfast 2 hours before. I brought 6 Science in Sport gels with me to the race. I got to use a few of them on my ultra the week before and while I think it has too much of a sugar taste I should finish my stack before buying more gels (I would probably think differently if this was my A race). Got my bib without any issue and got a .6 warmup run in before the race. I started doing warmup runs before races since the 2 mile race in Van Cortlandt I did with Kevin and Maria. Before that, I didn't do any warmup runs or drills before a race. I think it's been helpful!
Going into the race I had no idea what pace to run. I told some of my friends that I was going to do a crash and burn where I would attempt to run the race for a massive PR and then hit the wall and struggle through it. I figure the experience would help me for my A race in NJ in the end of April. However, still being sore from the ultra brought back painful memories of the Chicago marathon where I attempted to PR in the marathon distance two weeks after my 100 miler. Julie was aiming for a 3:36 goal and I decided that I didn't want her to wait too long for me so I should go for the crash and burn. I would hit the wall and I would struggle to finish the marathon but that's okay.
To delay hitting the wall I decided to not look at my watch at all (of course I could hear my watch beep and see the mile markers but I would not think about the distance left). I wanted to just focus on moving right now. I tried to not think at all. Here and there I would change up my breathing (in and out of nose, mouth and mix of the two) and think briefly on cadence. Sometimes I focused on relaxing my breathing, relaxing my arm swings and just stared far ahead, looking at the branches of trees. My idea was that if I was running more relaxed I could delay hitting the wall. I might have listen to a podcast about Japanese runners on my flight to NOLA. I had to remind myself of this plenty of times during the race.
The race started with an out and back along St. Charles street. I remember mostly thinking about how unique the trees were in this stage. Then it goes quickly through some of the touristy places of the till it hits the corner of City Park. Then it follows City park and does two out and backs along Lake Pontchartrain before heading back along City Park and ending in the park. A lot of the later miles had no shade and were on the boring side. The course was very flat with a few small 30-40 feet gains from a few small bridges.
The race was hot! It started in the 60s and ended in mid 70s but it felt hotter. I ran in North Carolina the week before and NYC had a few spring days so I thought I was ready for the heat. That quickly become untrue. As always with heat I started consuming gels more often. The race had three gel stations and at the first one (around mile 4) the gels were in a box. Not wanting to lose speed I quickly reached in the box for a gel. I ended up grabbing five and just ran with them in my hand. I usually do one gel after 4ish miles and then one every 3 miles after but from miles 10-20 I was consuming one every 2 miles. I grabbed another gel on the course as well and ended up only using two of mine. After mile 20 I started drinking gatarode instead of gels and throwing a water cup over my head at every water station.
I was able to run at what I felt was a sub 3:50 pace for 18 miles. Then I struggled to maintain pace for two miles before my brain started to slow me down. After 20 I lost my meditative state as well and just struggled. I'm normally pick it up after 20 miles but i wasn’t mentally strong enough. I been here before so I kept moving, only thing I could do. I definitively got passed by a quite a few people. With 5k to go I broke my rule of not looking at time and distance left. I realized I was comfortably in PR zone but still couldn't get myself to finish the last miles strong. With 2 miles left, my toes started hurting and I couldn't block it out. At the last bridge I noticed I was heel striking the ground, my running form was breaking down (something that has happened in my early marathons but not anytime recently, I blame it on my ultra the week before).
I saw Julie three times during the race and always tried to cheer her on. I saw Kieran twice as well and waved. He was pretty fast (he got a 3:16 something marathon). I caught up with Julie around mile 16 and tried to tell her what I been telling myself the whole race about not thinking about distance or looking at watch. Talking to her made me feel a lot better. I started to encourage other people as I passed afterwards for a bit. At around mile 18 I met a man from Mississippi who was doing his second marathon, also going for sub 3:50 and we talked for a bit before he had to slow down at a water station.
I was able to make a final push, sub 8 minute pace upon seeing the finish line. Sadly that was only a .2 distance but I finished with a little more than a 4 minute PR. Not too shabby!
Monday, February 26, 2018
Mount Mitchell Challenge 2018
Mount Mitchell
Challenge!
In the winter of 2016-2017 trail runner magazine came out
with an article about the best winter races.
The one that caught my eye was the Mount Mitchell Challenge. A 40 mile race that goes to the top of the
highest peak east of the Mississippi. Unfortunately,
the lottery for the race was in September of the year before so I missed
2017. Out of the five lotteries that I
entered for 2018 running races, this was the only one I got in.
The race goes from the town of Black Mountain through the
private college community of Montreat and then up double track trails till it
hits the Blue Ridge Parkway. From there
it traditionally goes on road into Mount Mitchell state park and then to the
summit! This year, they changed the
course to cut a bit of the road part to the top and instead go through the
single track, rugged Old Mitchell trail.
Then we took the road back down back to the double track to a slightly
different route back into Montreat and took smaller roads back to the town Black
Mountain. The race has about 4800 feet
of elevation gain and of course you have to get back down! For reference to my city folks, Harlem hill
has about 82 feet of elevation gain.
The elevation gain wasn’t the crazy factor for me. Just in NY, close by Breakneck marathon had
10,000 feet of gain in Coldsprings and the Whiteface Sky race in the ADK has
8,000 feet of gain in just 18 miles. The
new factor for me was that 1/3 of the course was on the road and most of the
rest was on double track where I’m use to my ultras being out on single track. So the course overall is easier and I feel
like you could get away with training mostly on roads for this one.
I arrived to North Carolina two days before race day. I did a moderate trail in Montreat run up Graybeard
Mountain via Graybeard trail and then made a loop going down the West Ridge
which went through some of the seven sisters (short hills) before descending
back to Montreat. 9.1 miles and 2700
feet of elevation gain! I planned to use
my Nike Trail running shoes that I got for free from my 100 miler in the fall for
the race but on this trail run I found that in the descent my toes hit the
front. The shoes were too small. I recently got max cushion shoes and while
they are comfortable, I found them extremely heavy when they got some mud so I
switched back to my Brooks Puregrits.
These shoes have finger wide holes on both sizes and easily have done
more than 600 miles but my quest for trail running replacements haven’t been
going well. The day before I did an easy
trail run in the River trail by the agricultural Ward Wilson College, a flat 5
miles. The Town of Black Mountain is by
Asheville which the podcast hosts of No Meat Athlete are from. One of the host specifically moved to
Asheville because it was more vegan friendly so I was excited to eat around as
well.
The Fear of Pain
I recently realized that I could run a lot faster than I
previously thought. I have always run at
a comfortable pace for most of the race before pushing hard at the end. I always thought it of it as running smart. However, from racing shorter distances I
realized that I didn’t even know what I was capable of. When was the last time I blew up during a
race or hit the wall? I was determined
this race to start off a bit faster than what I would usually do and see what
happens.
Nutrition
I did both my practice runs wearing my Ultimate Direction SJ
racing vest but in the race briefing the night before I learned that aid
stations were only 5 miles apart. So I
decided to waist belt and double bottle it.
I had one ultimate direction hand handle and another Salmon soft flask
that wraps around your wrist. The Salmon
flask has a pocket where I stashed a few gels and my waist belt stored my gel
flask and more gels. I brought 24
Science in Sport gels for $7 during a promotion they had so I used them for
gels and I used my hammer gel flask which stores about 5 gels in a tiny
bottle. I planned to use the Science in
Sport gels first, they had water in them so I used them to get some of my water
needs in well. At aids stations I
usually ate two orange slices and then moved on. I drank about 28 ounces of water during the
almost 7.5 hours I ran the race. Overall
I felt like I didn’t need much. I ate my
first gel at 45 minutes and then ate another every 30 minutes or so. Halfway I ate half a banana and near the
marathon mark I felt slightly off so I ate a few chips and a shot cup of coke
soda. I ended up not eating half my
hammer gel flask.
Start line
I parked at the finishing area of the race about an hour
before start time. Easily got a
spot. I had laid out half my gear out in
the dashboard of my car the night before.
Bad idea, in the 20 minute drive quite a few things fell and got tossed
around. It took me about 45 minutes to
get ready. I actually had to rush out
with one of my bottles only a fourth filled up.
I ran about a half mile to the start, got in the bathroom (thank
goodness for a real bathroom at the start) and joined the 500+ runners at the
race 3 minutes before start time. Had
enough time to tie my shoes and move near the back of the pack. The race has two distances, the challengers
who are doing the 40 miler and the marathoners who will run only to the Blue
Ridge Parkway and then turnaround. 500
people was a lot for an ultra and it had a road running start feeling to it.
The first 13 miles
The first 3 miles of the race were on main roads going to
Montreat. I maintained about 10 mile
pace with some steady elevation gain. I
passed a few people here and there. Then
we hit the double track where the pace quickly picked by. Passed a lot of people in the next few miles
here. It was hard not to get excited
when you finally hit the trails. Despite
the uphill the pace was quick but I stuck with it. I passed by the first aid station without
getting anything. The next few miles you
started to go back and forth with some people which allowed for some small
conversations. A guy gave me some of his
dried mango which I found delicious.
Conservations were a mostly about where you’re from, training, and gear
you’re wearing. I met a man that is
running this race for the 19th time and he talked about someone else
on course that is doing his 21st one (that’s every year since the
race started). This man ended up running
a lot faster than me and it blows my mind that someone who started running this
race when I was around eight years is still crushing it! As the trail got steeper I fell into a jog
walk but still moved on the quick side. Around mile 11 I started seeing the marathoners going back
down.
The Road Ascent
At around mile 13 we hit the Blue Ridge Parkway and started
a 2.5 mile ascend up on road. I drove up
this road the day before to take some pictures from the summit of Mount Mitchell. Recently, I stopped carrying a phone with me
while racing (since I should be focusing my attention on moving faster) so I
like to take my time the day before getting the photos. It was weird seeing the road from this point
of view. I started jogging up, I figure
that road would be a good way to do well on time but about a mile in, I got
passed by three individuals walking. So
then I started walking but I couldn’t walk as fast as these three. I fell about .8 of a mile behind by the end
of the 2.5 mile road ascent. Then the
course turned to single track, rugged trail with plenty of roots and
rocks. It was very similar to Catskill
terrain. It was also wet from the light
rain and fog. I made good time here,
easily passing those that passed me earlier.
I talked a bit with a man from Atlanta before I picked up the pace. I kind of just went whatever pace was natural
for me but people afterwards would tell me I crushed it there. Two miles later and we end up right below the
summit. A volunteer marks an S on my
bib. Summit and turn around to the aid
station. I eat a bit more here since I’m
halfway done before moving on. Now the
way back down is all roads till we are back on the double track. I was expecting to make good time here. Maybe 9 minutes a mile but I found my pace to
be around 10:30 a mile. I didn’t
practice running downhill fast so I wasn’t able to pick it up here. I found it different that running downhill on
trails which I am somewhat good at. Halfway
through the three that passed me on the initial road climb passed me
again. I started feeling off towards the
end of this section and then I touched my neck to find that there was a lot of
salt on it. As I hit the aid station at
the end of the Blue ridge parkway I decided to drink a shot cup of coke with a
few chips to get some salt and calories back in. I passed a few runners here with my shorter
time on the aid station.
The Double Track Downhill
The double back down was pretty rocky. I sorted of noticed on the ascent but on the
downhill I guess your feet hits the ground a bit harder so you feel it a lot
more. I did well here. I passed by quite a lot of runners. I talked briefly with a man from Burlington,
NC, it seemed like quite a few people were here from there. He was pretty impressed that I could manage
this race while training in NYC. The
double track became less rocky but still downhill and I slowed a bit here. There were quite a few splits of the trail
and the course wasn’t marked that well in my opinion. On the way up there were so many people so I
had no trouble finding my way but now I was running alone 95% of the way. I checked the map of my watch on a few of the
splits; I pretty much had to assume that the larger trail was the right
way. After what the first aid station on
the way up was is now the last aid station on the double track trail the trail
became a very steep downhill. I flew
down but at one of the turns I couldn’t tell if I went the right way (again
marking wasn’t as frequent as I’m used to).
So I went back up and found out that I was going the right way. I wasted two or so minutes here which sucked
since I was moving so fast.
Back to Black
Mountain!
The double track trail ended on Montreat roads and now the
road descend was crazy steep. It was the
steepest road downhill I ever encountered (even steeper than San Francisco
marathon downhills). I passed by an aid
station manned by Montreat college students.
As I got closer to finishing I thought about tips about moving fast that
I have gotten recently. I focused a bit
on picking my legs up a bit. A small
section cut through park trails and in one of them I spotted orange marking in
the middle of a stream and more orange marking on the other side. It was hard to tell at this point if they
belonged to the race or not. I jumped to
the giant boulder in the middle and was ready to jump into the stream to get to
the other till I realized that the orange marking on the other side was no way
a trail. I must have wasted 3-4 minutes
figuring this out and then proceed to continue the usual route. Found more orange marking so I assumed that
the other orange marking were a county or town mark for something else. Rest of the two or so miles went
smoothly. The race ended with a loop
around Lake Tomahawk.
After the race they had food in a community center
building. They had some delicious
mushroom soups and I filled up on bread with peanut butter, bananas and pinto
beans. I talked with a few of the
finishers and even a bit with the overall winner Morgan. He finished the race in 4:20, more than three
hours faster than my 7:23! Others that
finished the race said it was easier with snow since that covered up
rocks. It was the second hottest
temperature of the race, high 60s in the bottom and high 40s on top. After a little more than an hour of relaxing
and talking I went back to Asheville to get a postcard which ended up being a
lot harder than I thought. Next was
dinner and then the 10.5 hour drive back to NY!
I had two free beers that I could have claimed where they were doing the
overall awards but I thought that to be a bad idea before a long drive.
Saturday, January 20, 2018
Houston Marathon - Marathon #19
Houston marathon - Marathon#19
Untrained
and sore from a half marathon the day before, I finished my first
marathon about 4 years ago in Disney World. As soon as I finished I was
put into a wheelchair and pushed away to the medical tent. The next
quarter mile took almost a half hour to walk with every volunteer asking
if I was okay and I struggled with walking for 2 days afterwards. I
ended up injured for the rest of winter and spring, not being able to
run more than a mile. You think an experience like that would have
ended my marathon career, nope, marathon number 19 in the books!
Preconditions:
This marathon was a C race, pretty much just a workout as I am in the
end of my first base building block for the NJ marathon in April. I
debated whether or not to attempt the sub 4 the day before. I could run
about a 4:20 marathon in an easy pace, attempting to run it faster
would require some recovery time. Running it easy was probably in my
best interest but I was also looking for some redemption after failing
big time to sub 4 during the Chicago marathon. Plus the mental victory
of getting a sub 4 could help motivate future training. My runs lately
have either been at recovery pace (11-12 minute pace at under 130 bpm),
easy pace (10:30ish at under 140 bpm) and hard speed workouts. Not
having a long run at marathon pace was my biggest weakness going on to
the race. The day before I spent some time mediating which was new for
me. I got plenty of rest and did a trail shakeout run the day before
where I stopped plenty of times to take photos.
Nutrition:
I did a 6 day eating strategy going into the race. For 4.5 days I
focused on raw foods (lots of greens) and then switched to eating more
whole grain carbs. I don't do the huge carb heavy dinners as I prefer
having room for breakfast for race day. For breakfast the morning of
the race, I ate 1 banana with trader Joe peanut butter with flax and
chia seed mix in a sprouted tortilla, 1 normal banana and 1 apple 3
hours before race start. I took 2 hammer gel’s anti-fatigue pills an
hour before race and a glukos energy gel 15 minutes before race.
Starting at mile 4 I consumed 1 huma gel every 3 miles till mile 19 (6
gels), and ate a bit of gu chews at mile 22 (more for the mental
effect). I drank 16 oz of water, mostly with the gels and took a slip
of Gatorade at mile 17.
Gear:
Brooks Pureconnect running shoes (800+ miles on them), salmon hydro
handset (it's a 500 ml flask in a body bottle which means it compresses
as you drink, the narrow bottle mouth makes it hard to refill but I
wasn't planning to refill).
The
plan - My strategy was simple, cruise at around marathon pace for about
20 miles and then run the last 10k hard. I listened to a few running
podcasts the days before the race, one that stuck in my mind was the
race recap of the Bandera 100k by Mario Mendoza (who came in first). He
said he saved his emotions for the last quarter of the race and I
resolved to do the same.
The
course – The Houston marathon course is flat! Only 200 feet of
elevation gain, no cars cutting through the course, weather was mid 30s
in the start but warmed to mid 50s by the end so overall pretty good and
there was great crowd support. Only a small stretch at mile 10.5 and
around mile 16 felt empty crowd wise but overall there was a good amount
of people for a non-world major race. Your name is also printed onto
your bib so people could cheer your name while you run. The use of a
huge convention center as the staging area before walking off to your
corrals and as the finishing area was an awesome idea. Helped keep you
warm!
Start line – I met my
friend Hong who was running the half marathon inside. I didn't find any
pins in my drop bag so I went on the hunt for some. Lucky, a volunteer
from the drop area had some. Then the search for the bathroom. The
convention center had quite a few real bathrooms but they were mostly
blocked off. I think there were port-o-potties somewhere but managed to
find a real bathroom that wasn't blocked. I borrowed a Nathan hip belt
from Hong's girlfriend, I forgot to bring any sort of belt and my
handheld water bottle could only fit half my gels so lucky she had an
extra one. Running with gels in my shorts is doable but uncomfortable.
Hong warmed me about a hill near the end. In typical fashion I had no
idea about anything in the course. I just knew when looking for trail
runs that runners complained about the lack of hills in Houston. I then
I hurried to my corral. Unfortunately Hong was in corral C and I was
in corral B so we split ways here. In the corral I squeezed my way
through to maybe 30 feet behind where the 4:00 pace group was. Too many
people to get closer. They had a volunteer hold a giant sign for the
pace group but as it got closer to the start time, the volunteer went
away and I lost where the pace group was. I'm going to have to pace
myself.
For the first
half of the marathon my focus was on form. I kept things internal,
didn't allow myself to get influenced by any external stimulus. I
focused on cadence and getting into a cruising rhythm. A four hour
marathon is 9:09 pace. I ran my first mile at 9:10, almost perfect!
Second mile was 9:07, third and fourth were 9:10 once again. Things
were going well and I was a bit proud of myself for being able to pace
so well feel. After the 4th mile I went to get my first gel. I
struggled a bit opening the zipper on my handheld and getting gel. It
was a bit overstuffed which contributed to the problem. My 5th mile
ended up 9:18 but no worries it was the gel. Mile 6 ended up 9:20 and I
started to worry slightly. Mile 7 was back to 9:11 but miles 8 to 13
were all around 9:20. A lot of people in my corral passed me. It was
hard to see my cruising pace was not on pace for marathon pace but I
keep the consistent effort. It was too early to try speeding up. I
finished the first half in 2:02:37 which would have been around my PR
for a half an year ago.
After
the half way mark, I felt good so I decided to speed up. I realized
that I won't get the sub 4 if I kept the current pace up. I now allowed
external stimulus in, stopped focusing on form and started interacting a
little more with the crowds. This made me feel better and my pace went
to 8:40s. At mile 16 on a short out and back I saw the 4 hour pace
group about a half mile ahead of me. I decided to try to catch them
around mile 22. I started passing the people that passed me as well. I
probably sped up a little too much and as I got closer to 19 miles my
pace started creeping back to 9 minutes.
I
was planning to use the emotions at mile 20 to fuel a hard 10k to the
finish but by mile 19 I know I was struggling. I calculated my time and
I know it was borderline so I decided to dip into this well now. I
really needed to make it to mile 24, from there I should have enough
motivation (from being almost done) to do a final burst of hard effort.
To dip into the emotional well I simply think of family, friends,
teammates. Some people called my name out which helps. There was a
stretch by memorial park where they played music on speakers which also
helped (I don’t run with music). I probably went to using my emotions
too early and started fading by mile 24 but I knew I was close to
getting the sub 4 and I was going to make full effort to getting it.
Around
40 kilometers (about 1.3 miles left to finish), I told myself family,
friends and I started kicking. I always been good in being able to kick
at the end but this time I feel like I dug in deeper than before. My
mind went full focus into running. I didn't feel hard breathing or
fatigue, I just imagined the finish line just around the corner and
focused on getting there. At mile 41 I finally caught up to the four
hour group. The space to pass the group was in a narrow chute area so I
said "excuse me" as I approached and passed through. Someone from the
group said "wow" as I passed by. I had no thoughts at that moment about
passing the group but I now realized this was the moment sub 4 was in
the bag. My garmin watch has my last mile at a 5:37 pace, it's hard to
tell how much of that is true since mileage is a bit over (going around
people, not running tangents and such adds distance) but if it's
somewhat true, it would be my fastest mile yet (my last attempt at the
mile was about a 6:20 pace).
After
the race, we got the usual medals, banana and snack bars and went into
the convention center. There were changing rooms, more snack bars and
they also had a hot breakfast but no vegan options. I was able to find
free parking two blocks from the convention center (I did get there
early though) so getting out of the area to a restaurant was quick and
easy. Overall I would strongly recommend the marathon! My 20th
marathon is the Rock n Roll New Orleans marathon in March!
Monday, January 1, 2018
2017 - Year of Change
2017 was quite the year of change for me. I relearned
to swim, made many personal bests in cycling, running, archery, added
gym rock climbing, joined two running teams, traveled a lot and moved
out of parent’s house. But my biggest change to is what people often
refer to vanishing/wasting away Vik, I lost over 50 pounds in about 6-7
months from my switch to a whole foods plant based diet (basically a
high carb vegan diet with limited process food). This is my food
journey:
The idea of a
plant based diet was reintroduced to me when reading Rich Roll’s Finding
Ultra. Rich Roll wasn’t the first athletic who spoke about the
benefits of being vegan. Scott Jurek spoke about in lengths in his book
Eat and Run and I am a big fan of his but I ignored his claims at that
time. They both claimed more energy and faster recovery times. The
biggest difference now was that through experience and studying training
theories that I now understood how important recovery was. Finding
ultra was able to convince me to go vegetarian but diary however was a
different story, I grew up drilled by ads on how good milk is. I never
questioned why I ate diary and I felt it was essential to my identity.
The
next book I read was Whole by Colin Campbell which does a great job of
explaining why I feel the way I do about food. It was next on my list
to read randomly, I found it on Strand and thought the cover looked
interesting. I adopted my diet as whole foods plant based from the
book. I committed myself to reading four more books about nutrition
while slowly cutting out diary. One book wasn’t going to be enough to
change a lifetime of habitats! Reading more about nutrition helped keep
the ideas of plant based diet on my head as I changed.
I
started off allowing some weekly cheat meals (2 cheat meals, 2 cheat
desserts a week [not cheat days, that would be too much for me]) for
meat and dairy but my body adopted fairly rapidly. Within a month I
started becoming lactose intolerant. It started by getting a bit gassy
when eating diary (which was ice cream at this point) to stomach pain
for about 30 to 40 minutes and having the runs. That honestly made
things a lot easier, now I didn’t have any choice. As my body changed,
my taste buds also started craving fruits more and I slowly lost the
taste for diary and meat.
I
rapidly lost weight and without any training gained free speed. Just 5
weeks after going plant based, I came pretty close to my marathon PR
without training and while still recovering from a 50k the week before.
As my body changed, I become curious about testing out what it could
do. I started pushing the limits of my body farther in training. I
took on triathlon training and 100 mile training at the same time over
the summer. To my surprise my body was able to handle the load. I went
from someone who ran 30 miles a week to someone who ran 60-70 miles a
week while also biking and swimming (a little).
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