There are 53 days left until the Boston Marathon, and despite a few bumps in road since training started, I’m in a better spot this winter than I was limping into the Hyannis Marathon in February of 2009; in part because I’ve still got eight weeks left to get ready. Between winter injuries, inexperience and a schedule that put Hyannis too close to the marathon I’d run before it, I was a wreck. (Which begs the question, why do it, and more germane to this year, why do it again?! Maybe I can get at the answer a bit at the end of this post.) This year, after running a Boston Marathon qualifying time at the Baystate Marathon in Lowell, in October, I had more time to ease back on mileage, and then in mid-December pick back up on the training schedule I’d used for Baystate. That extra time, and the overall training base, have helped a lot. But it hasn’t all been smooth sailing. I suppose if it was, this wouldn’t have the appeal it does.
Coping with injury
The first third of the training, through some of the harshest parts of the winter, went incredibly well. I ran a PR for a 10K on New Year’s Day at Salisbury Beach (39:58, 6:26 pace), and felt like I was crushing my tempo runs. That lactate threshold/half marathon pace was beginning to feel, well, almost comfortable. My legs felt great. None of the usual tweaks and strains and aches. Despite high mileage and faster-than-ever training runs, my legs felt loose and easy and fine; remarkably so. Then, during the first five miles of an easy-paced evening, mid-week 12 miler, my right calf got tighter and tighter and then locked up entirely. The muscle spasms worked their way all the way around my leg in a ring of stinging ache, and finally settled deep in the muscle. I had to stop running, stretch, and then limp through another five miles at a slow jog to get back home. I didn’t want to miss a single day of marathon training, so I took the first week following that slowly, and reduced my mileage. But the first time I tried to return to a more intense workout pace, it happened all over again. So I took three full days off from running, worked out on the elliptical machine instead, and then came back at it again, with a few slow, low mileage runs. After more than two and a half weeks I still wasn’t sure I’d gotten it healed.
The Thursday three days before the Half at the Hamptons I tested it during and 11 mile run with my friend and training partner Curt. The calf was still stiff – it didn’t hurt, just felt different than the rest of my muscles – but, it didn’t seize up on me. I decided to run the Half and see what would happen. After all, if I didn’t push it there, I’d end up having to push the pace during a tempo workout that coming week; I was already 2.5 weeks off my training schedule for Boston, and needed to find out whether I could get back on it.
Half at the Hamptons
Curt and Ernesto after the Half at the Hamptons
The morning of Feb. 22, 2010 was cold and windy. When Curt and I got out to Hampton Beach, the flags were out straight in the air and the street signs were rattling in the gale. Part of me was worried the wind would bode ill for hitting the time I was looking for (6:53 pace should have been possible, and a good predictor of a 3:10 marathon time), but mostly I was worried about the calf knotting up on me out on the course – the way it had in the last two training runs in which I’d tried to push a tempo pace. We ran a gentle mile and a half warmup and the calf felt fine – the same as it had the other day, stiff but not painful. We lined up at the start and while the wind continued to blow, the sun came out and warmed things up. I was still glad of the gloves, tights and second top layer.
Curt went blasting out at the start, and held his pace for the whole race. We trained together for Baystate and ran only one second different marathon times. This time around he upped his mileage from the 50+ mile a week program we did last time (and I’m still doing) to a 70+ mile week. This hard work has brought him to a whole new level. He ran the Half, despite the wind, in 1:26:19, a blazing 6:36 pace.
Meanwhile, I found myself struggling for wind from the first mile. It may have been a chest cold and hacking cough I’d been dealing with for a few weeks, or it may have been the 2.5 weeks with no speedwork, or a combination of both, but I never got into a groove with my breathing. I held my goal pace, more or less, for the first 8 miles, but it was a struggle. Then a critical mistake finished off my hopes of completing the race at any kind of sub 7:00 mile pace. I didn’t take any fuel. Typically, I’d take a Gu or eat a cookie or something at about 45 minutes into a race this long. My body burns fuel quickly, and I consume a lot of calories on the run, both during races and on training runs. But perhaps because one does so many half marathon distance training runs during marathon training weeks, I underestimated the need. Or maybe I was just distracted by the worry about my calf. I paid for the mistake at mile 8.5. Coming out onto the coastline to turn south and make the run up Boar’s Head and then back to Hampton Beach, the strength simply ran out of my legs, the way it did at mile 21 of my first marathon. I was out of fuel. I kept running, but in that instant I’d gone from being able to hold that sub-7 pace to struggling for 7:15, then 7:24. There is no worse feeling than being completely out of fuel; it’s mentally dark, physically grim and makes you want to just give up and walk. I managed to get back under 7 for the last part of the last mile, but there was no salvaging the time.
I finished the race at 1:33:16, a 7:07 pace, 14 seconds per mile off my goal pace. I’d run close to this speed and distance on training runs prior to hurting my calf, and this would have been a disappointment, except for the fact that I also finished the race without ever having my calf injury return. And the relief over that, after such a long time working on rehabbing it, overwhelmed any consideration of my time. I’d be able to get back to the serious work of training for Boston before it was too late, with some good lessons learned in the process.
Lessons learned this during marathon training this winter
1. Eat and stay hydrated! You burn a lot of calories and water during winter training and during races. Don’t underestimate races. Just because you run half marathon distance training runs all the time as part of a marathon training program, racing that distance still demands serious respect. And plenty of fuel!
2. There’s no need to be totally uncomfortable in the cold weather. The first season I trained all winter I tried to dress so I’d be a comfortable after I was warmed up and miles into the run. That made starting the run difficult psychologically. This winter I’m dressing in layers that I can remove as a run proceeds. I’m comfortable at the start, and comfortable at the end. Maybe it’s not the most efficient method, but for me it sure beats shivering through the first two or three miles. I don’t apply the same philosophy to races, however.
3. When injured, take a few days off. You can get an great workout on the elliptical machine, and the days off from running will get you back to running good hard workouts faster than limping through a week’s worth of poor workouts.
4. Marathon training is multi-year process. It’s amazing the sorts of the efforts you can achieve in training with a year or two base mileage under your sneakers (well, under subsequent pairs of sneakers). And the harder you train, the longer you can run faster in a race.
5. And speaking of sneakers, replace them when they are worn out. I don’t buy the most expensive running shoes by a long shot, but I do replace them every 300-400 miles. And every time I try and stretch a pair past that, I pay for it with a tweak in my foot or leg.
And there’s a final, overarching lesson that comes out of this for me as well. It really underscores the whole reason I do this. I’m never going to be an elite runner. I’m not going to win these races, or break any records. But as I find myself a few months from 40, I realize that although life continues daily to get sweeter and richer, it sure doesn’t get any easier. And training to run marathons is a good analogy for all the other things life calls on us grownups to handle, reinforcing lessons we all should have learned as kids: work hard, strategize wisely, persevere through setbacks and disappointments, learn from mistakes, push past your limits, engage in your community and revel in the accomplishments of others.
Onward to Boston!
Tags: Boston Marathon, Half at the Hamptons, half marathon, injuries, marathon, Running, winter training
Glad to hear you made it through with no further injuries! That’s a real plus! So even though you didn’t manage the time you’d have preferred, the experience was positive! Everything is relative! Before my accident I used to walk a brisk pace and try to rack up time and distance for exercise with my pedometer. Now I’m exhilirated to push the envelope a bit further every day at my snail’s pace, and finding it great to make it up and down the stairs without wincing! As I tell my neighbors here, every day in every way I’m getting better and better!
Thanks, Mom! You’re right. And I’m glad to hear that every day brings new improvements! Though I’d never ever compare recovering from a running injury (which are all, in some way, self-inflicted, aren’t they?) to the challenges you’re facing as you recover from the accident, I’d be glad to think that some of the drive I have to push through these sorts of things without losing optimism was learned from you!
Thanks for the tips! Your picture looks great!! Looking so happy and healthy! Almost Boston time but not quite! Congratualtions. Oh BTW I had a dream about you last night that you were making $200,000 a year. I was a little envious but mostly wowed by you. As always, so impressed with the wonderful, healthy, full, loving life you have chosen to create for yourself.
Thanks Ana. And wow, that would be some dream.