Everything Counts

That was my race exactly. Even tieing my shoes at mile 8. My quads were achy from mile 11 on.

It's a good sign when 2:39 is a bad race.

Yes me too! I thought at mile 10 crap my quads are tired. I blame it on the weather/cold, I ran SG in the same conditions and felt the same way. It just makes your body shut DOWN.

Riley:

My biggest suspect is 203 miles in April. I think while other runners that are less inclined to middle distances might be able to get away with that for you that may be the undoing of your ability to store fuel.

Actually, I do not think a runner even needs to be inclined to middle distances to bum a marathon off a dropped mileage. In 1999 I managed to run 2:49:59 in the Boise marathon after overtapering - and it was not ridiculous - 45 miles a week for three weeks, that's all. My training partner who I beat in every race that year except that one and the one where I pushed Benjamin in the stroller ran 2:39:48 - we were together at 15 and then I just started losing it. What is interesting is that my training partner did the same taper with me, but it did not undo him.

Yuck. Looks like a repeat of the conditions at STG in 2008. Sorry the race wasn't good for you. It's really hard to overcome wind at the marathon distance.

Sorry it wasn't your day. Nice to see you out there (before and after not during!). I am still confident that you will hit your goals sooner rather than later. Just a better day and a few things to sort out and you'll have the race you deserve.

Sorry things didn't go to plan, Riley. Rest up.

Chad and Josse: Sorry to hear you both had similar struggles. I wouldn't wish that pain of running 16 miles with tight/tired legs on anyone. That was rough.

Sasha: I very much agree that my volume in what should have been the heart of marathon training was too low. That was when my knee was hurting and it was all the volume I could do at the time. I was planning on 80-90 miles a week in that stretch and instead had a 21 mile week and some lows 50s (maybe even a 40 I can't remember for sure and I'm too lazy to look right now). But I don't think it the sole reason for my struggles. I still think I should've gotten to 18-20 at sub-6:00 even with the lower volume. Really I probably should've called Ogden off, which I did consider, but I thought maybe I could still run a decent time.

The good news is I may have found a nutrition combination that didn't cause any GI distress, which is the first time ever! So, at least maybe something positive will come out of this.

Nice job getting through it while not feeling well and in terrible conditions. It's easy to speculate about all the factors but obviously it just wasn't your day and hopefully there is something you can learn from it. Rest up so you get in some good training for the US Half Championships. That 1:04:59 half is there for the taking.

Hey sometimes "stuff" happens don't sweat it, you've been ripping it up. Chalk one up for a mental victory on a crap day and put that in the bank. Easy to finish when you're feeling great. Well-done.

"I'm not super upset or mad with this result. It didn't go well at all but that can happen." Very classy statement. I am glad your GI didn't bother you and you are so quickly able to rebound and look ahead to the GREAT things in store for you, Riley!

Great attitude Riley and congrats on finishing a tough one. You're in the right place to take the positives from this one and move forward. The tough ones make us better and I know your breakthrough is coming. It's going to be something when it all comes together. Your tough one today is still 30 seconds faster than my PR ;).

Great report! Humbling experience that will give you great zen and tenacity for the rest of the year.

Strong work Riley. The marathon is a beast, always with ups and downs. Looks like you are having more ups than downs lately. Don't let this one get to you, it happens. Someday maybe I'll be in great shape when you have a horrible race, and we could run a few miles together!!

Ditto on everyone's comment. Great advise. I agree every race is a learning experience. The great thing about this running thing is there's always another race to make up for the last.

Tough day man. When you're "flat/off" in a half, you lose a minute or two, maybe three if its really bad. But when it happens in the marathon, it can become a death march.

Glad the knee held up, and that wasn't the issue today.

Also, figuring out a nutrition plan for the week and day of the marathon is really crucial. That means when you catch the "on" day again, you probably won't be losing any time due that that anymore. That will be huge for you. ~400 cals pre-race is exactly what I've done for every marathon. It might be on the low end of the spectrum, but you don't really risk having to stop. Its a hard thing to get just right, but it sounds like you did it better than in the past.

Like you said, some races you just have to move right past. Take the couple things you learned, don't dwell on it, and go forward.

You are one tough cookie! Way to battle through it. Heal up and go kill it in Duluth.

Man, as it's hard to separate the "competitive runner's mindset" to the "overcome self limits mindset" you really toughed it out today. Great job on that. I'm never the biggest fan of running in that type of weather so props to all of you who did.

The underlying principle with nutrition esp in long endurance events is finding what works for you. Exercise Physiologists more notoriously speak in terms of grams of Carbohydrates instead of calories, but as we all know what we as endurance athletes eat prior too and during competition is CHO etc. Ex. Physiologists typically recommend an intake of 1-5 g/CHO /kg body weight to increase blood glucose levels and promote muscle glycogen sparing (meaning you'll have more fuel in your muscles later on in the race) I think your 400 kcals isn't bad at all. I don't think you really need to be nit picky on "how" today went wrong, just that it did for whatever reason, and carry on ya know. As you don't have a history of consistent bonks, no need to read into it too much, you'll bounce back strong and UV1/2 and run down fast pr's in the months to come! Really excited to see what you can put together in the 1/2 and the full!

Agree with all the above comments, You have such a great attitude. When you say you were more strict on your diet with those eliminated food groups, were you just eating veggies/meat? Lately after running about 45 minute or when I pick up the pace I have been having the same issues you talk about.

Just wanted to add when you came through the finishing shoot there was a younger girl there who was telling her mother she had a crush on you... made me laugh:)

You're a class act. It's apparent that it was simply not your day. Keep that fire burning and you'll have a fantastic half marathon in Duluth, and you're bound to have the breakthrough marathon your hard work deserves.

Thanks everyone for your nice comments, I appreciate them and your support.

Christie: Here was my food schedule and it seems to work for avoiding my previous GI issues: Thursday night pasta with a very light olive oil based sauce and a plain baguette. Friday morning a bagel, powerbar, and white toast with peanut butter and honey. Friday lunch a turkey sandwich with no dressing or tomato and chicken noodle soup. Friday dinner grilled chicken and rice with only seasoning salt on it.

Not sure you were interested in that level of detail, but I figured it'd be good for me to have it recorded here anyway for my own future reference.

Looks like low to no fat, balanced protein and carbs. I am totally going to do that for St George. Thanks! (Cafe Rio grilled chicken and rice here I come)

Dave - make sure to try it out before a marathon simulation workout first, e.g a 20 mile run with the last 10 hard.

Riley - now that I've read the full report, some thoughts.

Your splits are quite similar, almost identical, to those of Joe Wilson in 2006 on the same course - both in terms of what they actually were and what they should have been. I do not know exactly what he did before the race, but I have a suspicion that there was a decrease in mileage involved. For some time he maintained a blog on this site, but it was in 2007, so you'd have to ask him.

I am suspecting that certain types of mid-grade muscle fibers - the ones that have the ability to be trained for the marathon - are also quick to convert into fuel eating hogs should you lower the mileage. They do not lose much of their top output over shorter ranges, but they just become like an SUV. Thus the runners that rely on them more (Joe, you, myself) will quickly lose marathon fitness off a relatively brief period of lower mileage, while those who do not (Fritz, my training partner Dallen) can drop the mileage some and still be relatively OK.

Regarding the nutrition during the race. I am inclined to believe that if you cannot run with zero nutrition or water intake on a not super-warm day within 2 minutes of the optimal nutrition/water intake performance, you just do not have your true optimal performance in you that day, so no need to worry about it. In other words, when you are properly conditioned, you have sufficient stores of glycogen, you are efficient in fat metabolism, and you are tolerant enough against dehydration so that should something go wrong with water or food during the race, you lose a little bit, but you are still very close to your optimal performance. When mid-race supplementation makes more than 5 minutes of a different in performance, it means you are not ready to run your best marathon - supplementation makes you faster, but you are still much slower than what you could run when maximally fit even without supplementation. A good case in point is Haile Gebrselassie - he ran 2:06 in London in a competitive tactical race taking nothing except water. In all of his attempts the fastest he could do was 2:03:59 being pulled by pacers most of the way in Berlin, which is probably about a minute faster than London.

Some people seem to be suggesting that a bad marathon should not be analyzed, and that it is OK to just write it off as being a bad day. I would strongly disagree with that. Bad marathon should be analyzed by all means, or else it will happen again. However, it should not be "analyzed" emotionally, and it should not be overanalyzed, which leads to blaming matters of no significance instead of understanding the true cause of underperformance.

That said, a bad marathon is a great character building experience. You discover that deep inside you there lives a creature you may not necessarily like. It does not want to run fast, it just wants comfort at any cost. It might be coaxed to be quiet if your splits are good, but should they not be what you wanted - just watch out! All it takes for that creature to rear its ugly head is a little drop in blood sugar and a few bad splits. Conquering that creature is worth more to me than a fast time. Fast times bare no eternal significance except that they stand as a witness that we have conquered the creature to some extent - for each of us a certain time - varying from person to person - is not possible without that victory, and a faster time requires a greater degree of it.

Now on to practical matters. I think the key from now on is to up the mileage safely. That might mean sacrificing speed work, and even some tempo runs. It may also mean that you have to keep the easy run truly easy. There is no shame in running 7:30 pace, or even 8:00. I estimate that to get the training stimulus equal to 10 miles at 6:30 pace you only need to run 12 at 8:00. The latter is much easier to recover from and thus the risk of injury is less. And we must mention the most frequently forgotten training principle. Training is not an agent of improvement, it is only a catalyst. The agents of improvement are nutrition and sleep. Training makes you eat more productively and sleep better - in and of itself it does not make you better. Thus you must eat and sleep properly to take advantage of your training - otherwise you are working, getting paid, but never cash the check.

Good work sticking with it, Riley. Now that you have your nutrition down, stick with it! I wish I had an education in nutrition because I only have a series of ungrounded hypotheses, but I'm beginning to think more solid forms of calories are better prerace (bananas, oranges) than chews and gels, but the "that depends" factor applies here if it ever does. Wesley Korir eats a tuna sub from Subway, which I find ridiculous but it works and it's part of his ritual. I eat Thai basil fried rice with tofu from one particular restaurant, which some people couldn't do or would find silly.

You showed some guts for this one, Riley. Much more difficult than running the race you wanted. Yeah, you can't analyze it too much. You'll probably never know why it wasn't your day. But it happens to everyone.

One thing to consider. In the few days leading up to the marathon, perhaps you altered your nutrition just enough that it caused problems during the race. Yes, you didn't have GI issues, but did it affect your energy levels? It sure sounds like your nutrition was great (from the menu you specified), but perhaps it was just enough different that it affected your performance. Probably not the culprit, but it's worth a thought. When I have an "off" race, I try to think of anything I did that was out of the norm. By reflecting in this way, sometimes a cause can be identified.

One thing is clear, though. You will have a breakthrough marathon. And when it happens, it will be special.

Matt: Thanks for the comments. I've actually been thinking about the race and I may have a possible culprit: allergies.

I was thinking how two years ago I also had a horrible time at Ogden and had to drop. Then I thought further back to college when we trained to peak in May and yet I always ran my best in April and then had no-energy, bad races in May (especially in Eugene, OR in May, just awful performances). I actually was prescribed an inhaler my sophomore year because they thought I had allergy-induced asthma. I wasn't faithful in taking it though and only did for like three weeks. But I started running ok again and felt it wasn't necessary. Then I never went back to an allergy doctor, because I didn't have health insurance at the time.

So, May has kind of always been my bad month of no-energy, I-don't-know-why-I'm-running-poorly races. And I think there's a good chance allergies could be the answer. I was prescribed an inhaler again last year two weeks before UVM (so like the end of May). But again I just didn't really use it because I didn't think I needed it. But who knows? Maybe I do need it, if not only in late April to early June.

So maybe that's the cause, maybe not. I'll pay closer attention next year and try to be more faithful on taking allergy medication (I haven't taken any this year; I just put up with the allergies) starting in April.

You may be spot on, Riley. I have struggled with bad allergies and allergy-induced asthma my whole life (I even had over 10 years of allergy injections). It has definitely affected my spring racing previously. I race much better in the spring when I am on allergy medication. Very good observation, Riley. And I agree, next year you should take allergy medication (perhaps you should even this year).