Ogden Marathon

What a race! This marathon was by far my best race at this distance. It was sort of a bitter/sweet experience. As I cut 26 minutes of my previous time, (how can you argue with that?) yet I fell just shy of the sub 4 hour mark I was shooting for.

This year the Ogden Marathon celebrated it's 10th year of the annual "spring run off." I was excited to participate in the full marathon distance this year as opposed to the 1/2 that I did last year.

After taking some time off from the Top of Utah marathon for recovery from my IT Band injury, I was surprised to see that I put on as much weight as I did. I began training again just after the first of the year at about 210 lbs. I couldn't believe that I had "enjoyed" the holidays that much! Anyway, as I began training it felt as if I were running with a very heavy back pack. It took a couple months of better diet and increased mileage before I started to see the weight really start to fall off... isn't it always that way? Anyway, by mid February I was below 200 and by marathon day I weighed in at 186 pounds.

I did a couple of things different this time around, and it really paid off. First, I researched some different training programs and found that the Hal Higdon program really seemed to make a lot of sense to me. I liked that he gave day by day advise on what to do, in addition added other useful information as it pertained to the training program. I followed his Intermediate I program as closely as I could and calculated that I ran about 529 miles in preparation for the big race. What appealed to me most about his training, was that his style was to teach your body to conserve energy and run for longer periods of time, it was much less about pace training as he only had me run a pace workout once every week, and sometimes every other week. This I believe was key in eliminating/reducing injury. The most difficult weeks by far were weeks 10 and 11. I discovered that my body, at least at this time can't handle much more than 40 - 43 miles per week.

The second thing I did different was I used a massage therapist during the training routine. This was especially helpful after some of the long weeks. I found myself feeling like injury was avoided because those muscles were worked out ahead of time. A friend of mine suggested going every 6 to 8 weeks during intensive running to help the muscles recover. I highly recommend finding a therapist that works for you. Mine does a fantastic job and she doesn't charge an arm and a leg either.

By the time race day came around, I felt better than I ever have before. I weighed less than the previous two marathons, I didn't have any nagging injuries, and my outlook to the race was much more positive. My goal, as stated before was to come in under 4 hours. I didn't really fall behind the pace until about mile 21, and at that point it was still manageable, but by mile 25 I knew the sub 4 hour goals was beyond my reach. At the half-way mark I felt so good, and Shanda commented that my form and everything looked like I'd just started running!

The first several miles of the race were a blur. I was lost in the scenery of the South Fork Canyon. Running along a loud river with the sweet smell of mountain air, it's really hard to call what we were doing exercise. Running the long straight away and then around the dam really passed quite quickly. I found a few runners that looked strong and appeared to be working toward the same goal as myself and kept pace clear up to about the top of Ogden Canyon. In fact, while in the canyon I could see their backs until about mile 23.

As I emerged from Ogden Canyon, I still felt pretty good about my pace and was excited to see that I could make my goal of under 4 hours. As I hit the next mile marker I calculated in my head that I would need to do an 8:30 mile the next two to guarantee it. As it turns out, if I could have stayed around 8:50ish I'd still have been close. Anyway, I felt confident as I had run that path so many times before in my training that I could achieve that kind of time. As I approached the next mile marker, 24 I looked down at my watch and thought I saw 9:30! Again, as I reviewed the times it turns out it was 9:14... strange. Regardless, I felt having pushed that hard and being that far back, I knew I wouldn't make the time. The next two miles 10:18 and 10:26. I really did hit the wall at that point, though I didn't stop running. This was also different from before, as I walked several times in Logan and Salt Lake. The only time I stopped running was at the water/power-aide stations and there I walked only long enough to get the fluids down and then I was back off and running again.

Turning on to Grant Avenue, with the finish line in sight, I dug deep and pushed myself to run as fast as I could... (still not very fast). It was all I had left in the tank to close it out, and I did it! My wife and parents said I looked great coming down the stretch. Once I crossed the line I couldn't believe the rush of nausea that came over me! For the next two hours I battled the urge to throw-up. It was difficult to eat anything and the weight of the medal hanging around my neck made me feel like I was on the verge of passing out.

Final time... 4 hours 3 minutes 24 seconds.

What a difference between marathons! I felt I had prepared before, but definitely not as much as this time. In addition, no pain medication was taken during the race. Zero IT Band pain, and no other nagging pains during the race.