Tomorrow is the Annual St. Patrick’s Day Race in Anytown, USA. I’ve signed up for the quick 3 mile sprint because my marathon day (not days) are over. I ran a marathon in August 2012 in Anchorage, Alaska and finished with a time of 3:54:13 (glute injury notwithstanding).
Training for tomorrow’s walk in the park started with my repatration diet after too much BBQ in Mongolia. The running came by way of treadmill something I advise against for serious marathon training but it hopefully did the job. My goal tomorrow is to finish in 21 minutes though the town doesn’t have Sprint service rendering my Runmeter app useless and my ability to pace myself impossible.
In preparation for the race, I consulted a Google Doc that details all the lessons I learned from running a marathon and decided to share the knowledge with you.
Consult a physician, dietician, someone who actually knows about running instead of following this hogwash.
Pre-Race Diet for a Sunday AM Race:
- Thursday: Caesar salad lite with 2 bags of fake crab and a box of pasta and tomato sauce
- Friday: 3 cups of brown rice (didn’t finish) and 1lb of beef
- Saturday:
- 1PM: pasta feed till 2:30PM;
- 6PM: 6 packages of flavored oatmeal
- Race Day: 1 Clif bar before race. 4 bottles of water.
Race Day Supplies:
- Racing Socks
- Racing Shoes
- Long sleeve Under Armour shirt.
- iPhone + iPhone extra battery case: The case top part didn’t let the headphones screw in.
Annoyances During the Race:
- shorts kept falling off
- armband was not tight enough
- stuff in my pockets: never again, no gloves either
Poppin Pills:
- Mile 6: 4 aleve, 3 non caffeine bloks: water
- Mile 8: 3 non caffeine bloks
- Mile 16: 6 caffeine bloks
- Mile 20: 6 caffeine bloks
- Mile 22: gu and Gatorade
*I may have drank a little more water along the way but minimal amounts. Each time I did I would feel horrible and have to wait to recover my pace and form.
Changes:
- Maybe i should’ve saved the gu for mile 24 but mile 22 was my fastest mile
- Mile 24-26.2 were the worst because the course stayed in the woods.
- Mile 20-24 were the best as i saved myself till then to actually go fast.
- Music also needs more power songs for last 3 miles: Black Eyed Peas weren’t cutting it.
Looking at all that makes me wonder how and why I ever would run a marathon. Tomorrow, I have no strategy and haven’t run outside. That could backfire but I guess I’ll find out.
