In preparation for the race I took off work on Friday so I could go to bed early. I normally work until 11pm and so I normally hit the sack at about 12:30am. I went to bed at 10:30 since I had to be up at 4:00am to drive to Soldier Field. It would have been nice to get more sleep, but whenever I try to go to bed to early I just toss and turn-it's not good.
Jackie and I drove to Soldier Field together, we got there at about 6am. Parking was nice and easy-and free. I picked up my packet and we waited around to meet up with some of her friends.
Before the start I saw Karen Sahr and Barb Bradley in the stadium and talked with them for a few minutes. I was trying to meet up with Carolyn for a pre-race photo op, but we never connected.
This was my first race using Hammer products. I have heard so many good things about them, so I bought some gels, HEED, and Recoverite. I took one of the Gels during the race and it did not agree with me. I think anything I would have taken at that point would have caused the same reaction-nausea. I had the HEED and Recoverite after the race and the taste was good, not too strong, but I couldn't tell if they had the desired effect.
The start was good, we were all in the A corral, so there was not too much traffic to deal with. My goal was to run 7:30 miles. I thought this was do-able since I ran 7:38 miles in a half marathon back in March. I have had some injury issues for the past few weeks, so I was prepared to adjust my speed based on how I felt. The first 4 miles went as planned, then.....the wheels came off. Here are the splits:
Mile 1-7:31---Feeling good
Mile 2-7:26---Ok, this is not so bad
Mile 3-7:27---keeping it up
Mile 4-7:43---Uh-oh-tried to take a hammer gel-almost puked
Mile 5-7:52---Something is wrong
Mile 6-8:34---Had to stop at porta-pottie
Mile 7-8:01---Karen caught up with me here, then dropped me like a bad habit
Mile 8-9:06---Nine minute mile? Seriously?
Mile 9-8:25---Barb caught up with me here and we ran the last 2 miles together.
Mile 10-8:31--I am glad she was there or I may have just walked it in.
As you might expect I am feeling very damaged today. Despite the poor performance/strategy I beat my time from last year of 1:25:xx and ran a 1:21:35 yesterday. So it wasn't a total train wreck. After the race I met up with my wife, Lindsay, and my kids, my Mother-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law and thier clever baby Will and we went to the Shedd aquarium for the rest of the morning. The crazy dolphin show at the Shedd made me feel better about my day. On the way to lunch I gave my oldest son Jack my other Hammer Gel-he loved it! Then we had a huge lunch at Panera and drove home. Pretty great day all around.
Sorry, no pics-forgot the camera. In the end it is all relative, my best day is someone's worst day and vise-versa
