Denver Marathon

Yesterday was the Denver Marathon... really cool course through downtown Denver hitting some nice parks... lots of hills and totally perfect weather. Both Drew and I ran, and then he headed to work for several hours while I did some other training (and whined alot).

Drew had a really good day with an easy 3:08 on very little marathon specific training (he's done a long run of like 1:30 since his 7:20 IMKy marathon)... He's now thinking maybe all that training he did for Boston (he followed a 18 week plan) was a bad idea... Drats. How do I enforce good training patterns when he can go snap off a 3:08?

For me the weekend was good hard. Saturday I split a little firewood, then went down to swim, to pick up my race packet, ran 5, and did a 35 mile bike. Was kinda tired by the end!
Sunday was the marathon. I think the cold I was fighting last week coupled by a good day Saturday made it a good test for running tired.

It went okay, but not really inspiring. I ran 4 minutes, walked 2 minutes from the start (it was a test to see if this strategy works for me). I felt that really slowed me down in the first half of the race, and I didn't feel particularly "fresh" at the end of the race. The soles of my feet were quite sore (ordering yet another new pair of shoes today for the end of the season). It was nice to have the beeping to force my to run in the last 6 miles of the race. My time was 5:45… okay… that gives me a 15 minute "cushion" for the third day of Ultraman but not great. I think I am not fast enough to balance the slowness at the beginning of the race with the running ability at the end.

My strategy for Ultraman is now looking like run easy the first hour (downhill and no sun) and then maybe go for something like run 8 minutes, walk 2 for as long as I can hold the 8 minute run. Then maybe switch to 4 and 2 at the end when I'm really tuckered out… The run day at Ultraman is right on the threshold of my abilties, but I will finish it! Hopefully the clock will be with me and I can be a legal finisher, but even if it is not I want to hobble away from this knowing that I did it as best I could.

For the Rim Rock Run (21 miler through the Colorado National Monument in 3 weeks... An AWESOME race I must recommend to you!) I might test this concept a little with run 4/walk 2 up the first 8 miles of incline, then run 8/walk 2 through the next 10 miles of rolling/slight downhill, and then run the rest (walking only the water stops) as the downhill is steep the last 4.

I'm pretty tired today, and have some foot tenderness I'm not happy with including a bit of facia pain proximal to my left heel. Will ice it this week for sure. This week is pretty easy runs through the week, with a 2 hour hike Sat (and 8-10 hour bike) and a 5 hour hike Sunday (with a 4-5 hour bike) to get some time on my feet but still allow for recovery from last weekend. Next weekend is "running camp" which basically means a high volume running week with very little biking and swimming.

Less than 6 weeks to go for me to Ultraman, and 5 for Drew to qualify at IMAz... 3 more weeks of good focus and then it'll be time to get ready to go play with my friends!