When I started my marathon training for Disney in September, the thought occurred to me that I might be able to do a spring marathon too. I wanted to capitalize on my marathon fitness and find a marathon that was in late February or March. A little searching around and I found out that the LA Marathon would be on March 21, and featured a new point to point course. I have a friend who lives in LA, so it seemed like a great opportunity. I decided to wait until my first marathon was finished (Disney) before I would decide whether to do LA or not.
After Disney, I took a week off from running, and then eased back into training. Everything felt pretty good, so at the end of January I registered for the LA Marathon. My interim plan was loosely based on 3 weeks recovery, 3 weeks training, and 3 weeks taper. I was planning to follow the final 9 weeks of my training plan I had just completed for Disney, except that the first few weeks in I would eliminate the speed work and just run the distances.
I soon found out that training for a spring marathon doesn’t work very well for me. The long runs were where I suffered most. If the weather wasn’t conspiring against me, it would be a hockey tournament for my son. My scheduled longest run of the weeks were: 16, 20, 16, 21, 10, 22, 14, and 10. In reality my longest run of the weeks looked like this: 14, 15, 7, 18, 8, 5, 6, and 7. I knew going into the race that my preparation had been less than ideal. My original goal was to run a 4:15, 15 minutes faster than Disney. By the end of training, my plan was to run 15 minutes slower than Disney, or a 4:45.
When I arrived on the Friday before the race, we drove over to Santa Monica so I could see where I would be parking on Sunday morning. I pre-booked the parking in Santa Monica and planned to be on a 5am shuttle to the start. Everything I had read indicated that I should be at the start early, so that’s what I planned. As it was, I didn’t have to get up any earlier than Disney, so how bad could that be? Having scouted the parking, we headed for the Expo. I didn’t have anything I needed to buy, so my plan was only to pick up my bib and talk to the Clif Bar pace team. Disappointment #1 – no 4:45 pace team, only 4:30 and 5:00. I grabbed both pace bands and decided to think about it over the weekend. Bib pickup was relatively straight forward. It was crowded, but the Friday after work crowds hadn’t hit yet. For some strange reason my bib had my age printed wrong by 10 years, but it was correct on everything else so I didn’t worry about it. I took a quick look at the “merchandise”, but decided that I really didn’t want anything. If it went really well, I would think about a “finisher” shirt on Sunday.
On race morning, I got up at 3am. I had some breakfast, a shower and got all my stuff together. I was feeling pretty good, so I decided to try to stick with the 4:30 pace team, and put on the corresponding pace band. I was out the door by 4:05. The drive to Santa Monica was fairly straightforward, although it was foggy and on unfamiliar roads. There were only minor delays to getting in to park. I walked down the street and just as I arrived they started loading 6 busses. Hopped on a bus, and was on the way to Dodger Stadium at 4:50. The trip was much quicker than on Friday and we were there a few minutes past 5am. I scouted out the bag dropoff, and then went in to Dodger Stadium. The lower seating area, concourse, and part of the field were all open to the runners. I managed to pass the time sitting, wandering, and making trips to the bathroom. At 6:20 or so, I went down onto the field to take a look at that. The grass seemed dewy, so I didn’t sit. I scouted out the corrals and then went to stand in a LONG porta-potty line. By the time I made it through though, it was time to head for the corrals. I managed to make my way to within sight of the 4:30 pace leader and then camped out there. After a little bit, they announced that they were going to delay the start of the race due to traffic. The announcer implied that some people had literally left their cars on the freeway and bailed out, but since there was no day parking at Dodger Stadium, I expect that there were still drivers in the cars. At that point I was particularly glad that I had planned to arrive early. Nothing is as stressful to me as being late for something. Finally they started the wheelchairs and elite women. The elite women start about 18 minutes ahead of the rest of the field, and there is an extra prize for the first runner across the line. Soon enough, they were doing the national anthem and the countdown was on. It’s always amazing how you can hear the start, but you don’t move for a few minutes. Finally we were moving and on our way. The first mile of the course is a left hand loop around Dodger Stadium. About a half mile in, there was someone who was down already and being attended to. I expect he took an accidental fall on the downhill, and his day was done already. When we came back around where we could see the start, I was amazed that there was still a steady stream of people still starting. I was happy with my pace through miles one and two, and although I looked at my Garmin and noted the times, for some reason I forgot to hit the lap button. Duh.
Through 10K and 20K splits I was almost dead on 4:30 pace. That’s about when things started to go off the rails a bit. The heat was starting to get to me, and I started to get thirsty, meaning that I needed more than a half cup of water at the next stop. I kept going, but just before I hit the 17 mile mark I decided that I was going to have to throw in some walking intervals. I did a bunch of walk/running and jogged in the last mile or so when we made the turn onto Ocean Ave. The final score wasn’t pretty – 5:03:52.
I have to say though, that I really enjoyed the experience of this race. The crowd support was wonderful – I heard my name so many times. The sights along the way were neat too. Even after saying that I’ll never do another spring marathon, I’m actually contemplating doing this one again next year.
My splits for the race:
1 – 11:00 (approx)
2 – 10:30 (approx)
3 – 9:53 (approx)
4 – 10:21
5 – 11:19
6 – 10:03
7 – 10:11
8 – 10:27
9 – 10:18
10 – 10:25
11 – 10:08
12 – 10:32
13 – 10:55
14 – 10:38
15 – 11:16
16 – 11:47
17 – 14:06
18 – 13:00
19 – 12:18
20 – 13:26
21 – 16:04
22 – 12:27
23 – 13:53
24 – 13:25
25 – 12:45
26 – 11:22
26.2 – 2:14
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