I have reached an interesting point in my running career, such as it is, in that the half marathon distance has become less of a milestone and more of a long training run. In some ways, I regret this - my first race with Team in Training was a half marathon and it was such a momentous thing for me to cross that finish line. On the other hand, it's been an adventure for me to take that distance and do different things with it. I've raced it in Chattanooga and managed a sub-2. I've slogged through it in New Jersey and ridden roller coasters after it in Coney Island. All in all, I've run eight half marathons.
But when marathon training, as I have been all summer, the half marathon becomes less of a goal in and of itself than a piece of the larger puzzle. In the last few weeks, I have run two half marathons as long runs - including a reprise of the same course that provided that first big racing thrill for me in San Francisco two years ago. In many ways running a half marathon as a training run in preparation for a marathon is a great idea - you get your race-day routine honed, and you can test out your strategies with clothing (arm warmers? shorts or capris?) and gels (I've recently begun a love affair with AccelGel) on an actual race course. It's given me a new appreciation for the distance. What I've lost in thrills, I've gained in appreciation for the science of the half.
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I ran the Staten Island Half Marathon on October 10(10/10/10!) with friends. This is part of the New York Road Runners' Half Marathon Grand Prix - there is a half in each borough every year, and if you run all five you get some kind of swag. I have only ever run two in a year - the Bronx and Brooklyn in 2009, and Brooklyn and now Staten Island this year. Next year, I've resolved to try all five.
Turns out Staten Island is pretty enjoyable. I've only been there once before, and then only as long as it took me to turn around in the ferry terminal and reboard the boat to return to the Manhattan side. So it was nice to get a look at the place. I was also grateful just to be outside, since three days before the race I was felled by a nasty stomach bug. I had called out of work and laid prone on my couch; I also had barely eaten a thing in 72 hours by the time I woke up Sunday morning.
Guess it says something about my progress as a runner, and about my strength-training program, that I was even able to finish the Staten Island Half. I won't lie - it was rough. I ran with my friend Michele, and I think had I been alone I might have quit. The day was beautiful, sunny and about 65 and clear - but running without fuel in the tank is difficult, and a few times I just felt too weak to keep going. Plus Gatorade and gels tasted funky to me because of my sour stomach and I was just struggling to get any calories in.
By the time Michele and I hit the turnaround (the course was an out-and-back) at Mile 6, though, I figured I had to finish because now I was as far away from the finish line as I could be. On the return, the course went through Fort Wadsworth, where runners wait for the start of the NYC Marathon - so that was cool. The not-so-cool part was that Fort Wadsworth is up a large hill, and that really taxed my limited reserves.
Something about the race situation got to me at the end, and I was able to pick up my pace slightly to get over the finish line. I made faces and rock 'n' roll hand gestures
at the race photographer and hit the finish line in 2:12 - not bad considering all the strikes against me. I'd love to come back next year and really try to race Staten Island, because the course seems like one I could fly on.
All in all, Staten Island showed me that I can finish strong even on a really bad day. I don't feel like I would fold in a longer race even if I felt depleted - I will be able to look back at this half and see that I depended on my friends, I stuck to a nutrition/hydration plan and I recited mantras (well, I sang "Break My Stride," but whatever works, you know?). My mental game has improved even more than my physical one in the last two years - something more valuable to me, really, than the feat of 26.2.
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On October 17, I returned to San Francisco and the Nike Women's Half Marathon. In the fall of 2008, this was my first event with Team in Training. At the time, 13.1 was the farthest I had ever run, and it was such an amazing feeling to round the corner onto the Great Highway and cross that finish line. I wondered if it would feel the same this year.
I've been plagued with injuries while training for NYC this summer. It started with tight hips, spread to a recurrence of IT Band Syndrome that flared in both hip and knee, and ended with a shin splint above my right ankle that had me convinced I'd suffered a stress fracture and ended my season. An MRI showed that it wasn't a stress fracture, and my physical therapist was able to go in and massage out the knots and help me keep my calf muscles stretched. Turns out my arches collapse with every step, which explains both the bouts with ITBS and the stress to my shin. Eventually the pain lessened but I missed three long runs and many shorter training runs while I waited to be diagnosed. I was disgruntled and discouraged. Why was I doing this? I asked myself. Why a marathon?
Turns out, a great half marathon is a no-fail cure for the marathon blues. Cleared to run by the physical therapist and armed with brand-new orthotics in my Brooks Adrenalines, I arrived in San Francisco with strict orders not to race, but simply to use the course as a long, slow distance run. A long, slow distance run with a Tiffany necklace waiting at the end. The slogan for this year's race was "I Run to Be" and I spent a fair amount of time thinking about what I run to be. Do I run just to be a marathoner? Because that's what this summer has felt like. I've spent so much time training that I tend to lose focus on what makes my individual runs interesting. So I decided to enjoy San Francisco to the max.
Also, my mom came with me to hang out in San Francisco and to watch me race. That's pretty cool, especially since she's also coming to New York. We had a fantastic weekend - we ate amazing Vietnamese, Mexican, Italian and Japanese food, memorized the bus and cable-car system and used it to get all over town, and saw some old friends. We got into a sold-out art exhibit at the de Young Museum using my press pass and we drank coffee at all the places the East Coast hasn't scored yet, like Peet's and the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.
The day we arrived, we picked up my race number right away and I got all my race stuff laid out in the hotel room. The Nike "Expotique" was less an expo than a mess of free Gatorade/Luna Bar/Kashi samples, so I strolled through but didn't get too caught up in it. Two years ago, I was so focused on Team in Training stuff that I didn't get to enjoy the city. This year, I was more focused on hanging with Mom and staying calm and relaxed. This was a smart strategy. I did go for a warm-up run with the team the day before the race and enjoyed that.
Sunday morning, October 17, I met the rest of my Team in Training group in the Union Square Marriott lobby. I was test-driving a new pair of SmartWool armwarmers I hoped to wear in NYC and my singlet had my name on the front and a shout-out to Greg on the back. One chocolate AccelGel and one vanilla in my pocket. My NYC 2010 hat, so I could keep one eye on my bigger goal (and the other one on the fireman holding that Tiffany necklace!).
My friend Hannah - my running buddy during a super-tough TNT run earlier this summer and a fellow NYC runner using SF as a training ground - joined me and we checked our bags first thing. Then we stood around in Union Square with 19,998 other women and waited for the start gun. Hannah brought me purple gloves, which was awesome and which I ended up giving to our coach Radie, who was going to be out on the race course all day and was already shivering. The Nike Women's race is a major Team in Training event and there are purple people from all over the country there. I find it quite inspiring.
And we were off! I saw my mom at the corner near the start line, but I could not move over in the crowd enough for her to see me. I found out later she was really upset about missing me and felt terrible! Hannah and I quickly found out that there was no way to get into a smooth pace on this very crowded course, unless you wanted to waste a ton of energy weaving through. We did not. We also vowed not to stop at any of the water tables, which were pretty epic clusterfucks. We ditched our throwaway shirts two miles in at the designated recycling spot and saw Hannah's stepfather in Fisherman's Wharf, around the three-mile mark.
Four miles in came the first significant hill, and the first time we realized how prepared we were for said hills. All our Jazzy bootcamp and hill repeats with TNT paid off in dividends as we charged ahead. Coming off that hill, some girl tried to push us both out of the way. So uncool! She was not, it should be said, wearing a TNT shirt.
Six miles in, the HUGE hill popped up. It was rough going, but our reserves kicked in and we were gone. Coach James saw us at the top and took this photo of us:
as we crested the hill. So awesome. Two more miles of rolling hills, broken up by a bunch of people handing the best orange slices you've ever tasted, followed. Then a giant downhill by the ocean featuring speakers blasting "Don't Stop Believin'." When I hit this hill two years ago, I realized I was going to finish my very first 13.1 and live to tell the tale. This time, I realized that I had run 10 miles without even blinking an eye, without any pain, and not only was I going to finish this race strong, I was going to finish my marathon strong. Just like that, my mental game, blocked by all my injuries and fear of failure - was back. It was a great moment. Not even the rain that started falling here could tarnish that. (I later found out that the full marathoners on our team, and our coaches, took the brunt of that rain and still had great days. Pretty awesome.)
Hannah and I finished strong, shrieking "Brooklyn!" into the finish line in about 2:25 - where I saw my mom! And she saw me! And we jumped up and down and shrieked more! And then I got my Tiffany necklace and my finisher's t-shirt and Mom and I met up with a friend from Chattanooga who took us for coffee and pancakes and a tour of her wonderful neighborhood. That night I had sushi with Mom and beers with my coaches and the Team in Training staff. The next day Mom and I went to Sears and had 18 tiny pancakes between us, and I got a shirt that said "I Run to Be...Closer to My Coffee" (finally! the true meaning of that slogan!) then went to Fisherman's Wharf and Ghirardelli Square and rode a cable car before catching red-eyes back to our respective homes. I want to do it all again.
