The Last Long Run!

Saturday March 26th 2011 - Hopkinton to Heartbreak Hill

Today's run was the "Peak" distance run for my marathon training. The plan was to do 22-23 miles on the Marathon course with the RFTM crew. For this one, I convinced both Dan Davin and Dave Soligon to come run with us. We decided to meet the crew in Hopkinton instead of going all the way to Newton and then back to Hopkinton in the van.

Every year, the BAA sponsors a charity group training run 3 weeks before the marathon. Not all of the charity groups take part, but the ones that do (and that's most of them) bus or van their runners out to Hopkinton and everyone runs the course as far as they want to back towards the city. There are lots of water stops supported by both the BAA and the individual charity groups. There were even some VERY welcome port-o-potties in the town common in Hopkinton. Most runners do about 21 miles which puts them at the top of Heartbreak Hill in Newton.

After getting a ride from Dave's girlfriend Karen to the start line, a few quick pictures with the group and a pit stop to the green plastic box, we were off.

I knew from the first quarter mile that I was going to be paying the bill for this week's heavy mileage, particularly thursday night's 9 mile tempo run. I didn't have any real specific problems. No foot or hip pain. No "bathroom" issues . No nutrition or hydration issues. I just never felt GOOD. It never felt effortless or even enjoyable like it has in past long runs (including a 21 miler two weeks ago.)

So without a lot of excitement or stories to recall later, I just tried to keep my chin up and grind this one out. I decided early on that I wasn't going to do the goal distance of 22-23 miles, but that there was no way I wasn't going to at least make it to the top of Heartbreak Hill.

Just under 3 hours and 20.5 miles later I crested Heartbreak. Another easy .6 miles down the hill put me at my all time distance PR of 21.1 miles. Then I stopped. I knew I didn't have any more "good energy" left in me and continuing wasn't going to get me any gains. I felt a tiny bit defeated for not getting my goal distance, but then I reminded myself that I had just run over 21 miles!

I think I'm ready for Boston.

Admittedly, my first knee-jerk reaction to not being able to do the 23 miles was that I was in trouble for the Marathon. After all, this was my last chance at an over-distance training run. From here on out, the taper begins and I wont be doing more than 15 miles again before the race.

After changing into dry clothes, getting a coffee, and having a chance to think about it though, I realized that this run and the marathon were completely different. I had run my longest and hardest week  ever leading up to today. I was, quite frankly, beat up coming into today. Less than a half a tank of gas at best. For the marathon, I will have been tapering and resting for nearly 3 weeks, and will have the freshest legs I've had all winter. Also, the marathon will be, well, the BOSTON MARATHON! Even as beat up and exhausted as I was today, I think I could have finished if there were a million cheering spectators on the course, not to mention all of the adrenaline that comes with them!

20 days till Boston......