Another installment of “the sub 3:10 dream continues to live on”.
I ran the Sydney marathon on Sunday, 15 September in 3:11:27, a personal best by 56 seconds, which I am so happy about.
After a slew of bad marathon races, it has been refreshing to be able to know that I am still capable of breaking my personal best time!! After putting so much pressure on myself for the past few races (in particular, New York last year and Boston this year) and not being able to enjoy the race as much, my primary goal was to focus on enjoy running the race, and I knew my training had gone well, so a good time was the cherry on top.
The day before the race (Saturday) I found myself being surprisingly calm and not needing to obsess over splits, as I had done previously.
I wanted to enjoy running marathons again, but I also did have a bit of a strategy, it was to start out conservative for the first 30km, then try to pick it up in the remainder if possible.
The course was pretty hilly ~317m elevation gain, but the hills were sprinkled throughout the course. During the race the temperature was around 8 deg C, cool and optimal for running, but there was constant wind, which made it feel even colder. I had some throwaway arm warmers and gloves with me, but had left them on longer than I had anticipated. I took the arm warmers off around 16km, and left the gloves on until close to 30km.
I was happy that I was able to run my race evenly, and these are my splits throughout the race:
- 5km 22:32 (4:30 min/km)
- 15km 1:07:39 (4:30 min/km)
- 21.1km 1:34:34 (4:28 min/km)
- 30km 2:14:48 (4:29 min/km)
- 40km 3:01:39 (4:32 min/km)
- Finish 3:11:27 (4:32 min/km)
For a 6 am race start, I was up at 3 am and I arrived at the start area at around 5 am. After meeting a few friends and going to the bathroom, time had flown by. For my wave, the process of getting to the start was a bit chaotic, and by the time we had gotten into the start corral, it was already time to start the race. The start of the race had been very cold (close to freezing temperature).
Being rugged up in some throwaways at the start line.
The race began on a steep downhill, before climbing up towards the Sydney Harbor Bridge. I hadn’t made a specific plan to run with a pace group, but about 1.5km in, I saw the pacers for the 3hr10min group and decided to stick with them as it seemed like a good group. There were 3 pacers, and throughout the windy course, they had made a huge effort to block the winds for many people. I think the decision to stick with pacers turned out to be a good one for my pacing. The pacers were also really helpful in keeping a controlled effort on the slight hills and turns on the course.
The first half of the race was much of a blur, I found myself being really focused, dialed in and in control. Throughout the entire course it was cold and windy, and I had left my throw away arm sleeves and gloves on for longer than I had anticipated. About 15km I found myself feeling really good, I felt like I was ready to push the pace a bit - but I knew it was too early to feel good, so I just embraced the feeling and continued to stay locked into the group.
On crossing the half-way mark, someone in the pace group started singing “we’re only half way there .. ohh ohh” from Bon Jovi, and for some reason I found that song stuck in the back of my head for the remainder of the race.
Upon reaching 25km, the pacers seemed a bit surprised I was still there with them, and again I was feeling good and the thought of pushing the pace also crossed my mind again. But I told myself that this was the point which I needed to be patient and wait till the 30km mark.
I reached the 30km with the pace group in 2:14:48 (just under the required 2:15 split for a 3:10 finish), it felt good to reach this point of the race and still be in control. It was not soon after, around the 32-33km mark where I found my quads starting to tire a bit (most likely from the undulating hills encountered so far), I made a purposeful decision to drift to the back of the group and tried to drift off them. As I was drifting off them, I told myself so hard to not give up and reflected on all the training that I had done to get here, and how I only had less than 10km of running left in the race. This took me until about 35km, where there was a slight uphill and a few more turns, on one of the uphill turns I just started to loose contact with the pace group. I had decided that my legs were feeling too tired and didn’t have it in me to reattach to the pace group.
By about 38km, I realised that I had forgotten to take the gel I was supposed to take at 36km gel, and wasn’t sure if I should take it, but I took it anyway. In this part of the course (39-31km), it passes through this infamous section called “Mrs Macquarie’s Chair”, it’s a pretty common section in many Sydney road races. It’s an undulating windy out and back that you have to do, and just really hits you in the face when you need it the least.
Picture that my dad took at about 40.5km, my hand is up, as an attempt to wave to my Dad who was screaming my name. I then gave it all I could muster for the downhill finish, in front of the Sydney Opera house.
I’ve now completed 17 marathons (including 4 majors), and every marathon finish is special in it’s own way.
Photo credits: Natalie Wong
@beyond_theroad_