I ran the One City Half-Marathon, finishing in a time of 1:33:20, which was good enough for the female masters win.
This race was a little bit about unfinished business. In 2020 I started the One City marathon but had to drop out about 5 miles with SI joint issues. And then, of course, Covid hit. So this was in a sense a second shot at the race, though I decided to do the half this time instead of the full.
***
I left home on Saturday morning about 7:30 am to drive down to the Newport News area. Experience has taught me that you can leave the DC area before 8 am and be there in about 2.5 hours. Or you can leave after 8 am and be there in around 3.5-4 hours. I chose door #1.
The drive went smoothly, I caught up on my NPR, and I pulled into the parking lot of my hotel around 10 am. Since you don't know if you don't try, I asked the desk clerk if I could check into my hotel room early. The response was that my reserved room - a suite - wasn't available yet, but I could check in now if I was willing to accept a downgrade to a double (with the appropriate rate reduction).
Since I had only booked a suite because regular rooms weren't available, this was A+ pure win. I dumped my stuff off in my (cheaper) room, and then headed off to quest for my bib and goodie bag, plus some Chipotle. With all of these things acquired (and consumed, where applicable), I settled back into my hotel room for the afternoon and evening, listening to music to try to get the right relaxed rhythm stuck in my head for racing a half-marathon.
(This weekend's choice - Delerium's Karma album. Every few years I experience a major Delerium kick, and I think that time is upon me again).
***
Race morning dawned pretty early. This race is point-to-point, with buses leaving from either the host hotel or the finish line to the start. This year I stayed at a hotel a few miles from the finish, in Hampton, which meant that I had to drive to the finish, park, and then get on a bus to the start.
But first I had to eat breakfast. Which required a fair amount of planning.
To explain - I'm currently on a medication called Rytary to manage my neuro stuff and make it easier for me to run. I take it four times a day, at roughly 5 hour intervals (there's a little flexibility there). It takes about 20 minutes to kick in, and then I've got a nice window of about 5-6 hours where it works (it's the extended release version of the Sinemet I was on for Houston, so I have a longer window of effectiveness). So I needed to time stuff so that my race fit within a 5-6 hour window after taking the Rytary.
Rytary has to be timed around meals since too much food (especially protein) will interfere with the uptake. A small carb-only snack (like a gel) is fine, but larger meals need to be either 2 hours before taking the Rytary or 30 minutes after. So I needed to time my breakfast around taking the Rytary (racing without eating breakfast, or just having a gel for breakfast, is a no go for me).
However, I also have ulcerative colitis - it's very well controlled, but I've learned that I really need to be right by a bathroom (and NOT in a car or on a bus to the start line) for about 30 minutes after eating breakfast. So I needed to time the Rytary and the breakfast to give me enough time to take care of that.
And of course, I also needed to drive to the finish line, get on the bus to the start, warm-up, and start the race at 7 am.
So....I had two options - either:
1) take the first dose of Rytary around 1:30-2:00 am, then go back to bed, and then wake up and do all the other stuff before taking the second dose of Rytary at 6:30 am at the start line (what I did at Houston when I was on Sinemet), OR
2) wake up at just the right time to take the Rytary and then eat, clear out the pipes, get to the start, warm-up, and race within the 5-6 hour window.
Since this was only a half-marathon (and since I haven't practiced routine 1 with Rytary), I opted for routine 2. So my alarm went off at 3:45 am, and I took the Rytary and then got dressed and did some yoga until breakfast at 4:20 am. Then I hung around the hotel, checked on Tokyo Marathon times, and did the needful until I was clear to go.
[Why am I writing all this TMI stuff out in such detail? Because I can reference it next race when I'm trying to figure out how to time things. And perhaps there's someone else out there who is trying to manage the same issues, who will find this helpful.]
***
Having medicated, dressed, stretched, eaten, and pooped, it was now 4:55, and time to head out.
I debated whether to check out of my hotel and load my suitcase into the car before heading to the finish line. I ultimately decided not to do so, since I wasn't sure how secure the parking lots would be at the finish line, and I didn't want to risk having my stuff stolen during the race. As it turned out, the lots were monitored the entire time, so it would have been fine.
I also allowed a lot of time to get to the starting line, assuming that there would be some chaos finding a parking space, and some more chaos finding a bus. As it turned out, everything worked like a well-oiled machine, and I was on a bus to the start 20 minutes after leaving my hotel room.
[Seriously - I was impressed with how well this race was organized. I've run a lot of races, and this one is in the top echelon in terms of how smoothly everything worked. Especially for a point-to-point race, which is always harder to organize than a loop course.]
This meant that I got to the start line around 5:40 am, instead of my planned 6 am. So I had some time to kill. I headed over to the elite tent (I was offered an elite entry for this race) where I saw a friend who had also gotten there early. So I chatted with her instead of focusing on how cold I was, and the 20 minutes until 6 am flew by.
***
I went with my standard warm-up of around 15 minutes jogging, then 3 minutes at marathon-down-to-half marathon effort, 4x30 seconds at 5K effort, and 4x10 seconds at mile effort. My legs felt good and decently reliable after the always-iffy first 5 minutes of running, and they had some bounce to them as well - a nice indication that I had gotten the taper right.
After about 3 miles of running, I headed back to the elite tent to stow my throwaway sweatshirt in my bag (I'll toss it next race). Then I did some walking, some water sipping, and a Maurten gel before joining others at the start line.
***
The start of the race was chaotic as they always are. The course started in the parking lot of a school, with an immediate 90 degree turn to the left. Knowing this, I had deliberately started on the right side, so that I could swing wide and have some space, since my dystonia/gait issues are worst in crowds. This helped some, but then I had to merge back into traffic. Shortly thereafter I was unpleasantly surprised by a mild downhill on what I had thought was a flat course. That amplified my gait issues and I just had to make my way down it as best I could. Fortunately, that was followed by a gentle uphill (which probably only I appreciated).
So the first mile and a bit was awkward, and then the course became quite flat and the crowds thinned out, and I was able to hit my stride.
I ran this race the same way I run tempo workouts - ignoring my watch (though I took manual splits for posterity). Instead, I mentally located my "red line" of tempo effort, worked my way up to it from underneath, and hovered right there. This is how I run my 4 mile track tempos - I sit at that red line of effort until I have a lap to go, and then I pick it up slightly. The only difference was that during this race I'd be sitting at the red line for a lot longer, until I was about a 1/4 mile from the finish. Then I'd go. If I could.
***
By mile 3 I was alone, with just the rhythm of my footsteps and a few runners ahead in the distance. I was pretty happy because this was exactly what I had hoped would happen. All the dystonia stuff is so much better when I am by myself, and now I had a chance to race that way. From then, it was just fun, I was working pretty hard, but in control, and slowly reeling in the pack ahead of me, while Delerium's Firefly played on my mental jukebox.
The miles rolled away, a mix of a college campus, a park, some neighborhoods, and a bit of waterfront.
I did note one of my favorite course "decorations" ever around mile 6, which was mile 19 of the full marathon. A family had set out a recliner on the side of the road, with a table with some drinks next to it. A sign over the recliner said "quitter's chair" or something like that. A large sign next to the recliner said:
You are very far from the finish
I laughed (inside). In fact, I was distracted enough that I missed the elite water station (and my water bottle+gel) a few minutes later. I spotted it just as I ran past, and debated circling back to grab my bottle, but decided that it was cool enough that I could get away without water, or use a normal water stop if I got desperate. I had pinned an extra gel to my tights, so I was fine there.
***
The miles continued to pass, though each one seemed a bit harder than the previous. As we entered the downtown area, I glanced at the windows of a store front to check out my gait, which felt really good. And whadyaknow, it looked OK too. Like how I used to run. Awesome (and a great emotional boost).
The miles got much longer as we entered the VERY long (about 2 miles) straightaway that was the approach to the finish. I was hanging on by this point, which told me that I had paced this one just about right. The race finish itself was around a corner - about 100m past that corner in fact.
I had checked out the course online and knew that the 34th street intersection was about 800m from the finish and the 29th street intersection was about 400m from the finish. I tried to kick as I crossed each of those, but I really didn't have anything. Then I came around the corner and saw the finish line and found maybe a very tiny kick.
As I approached the finish, I saw a clock, and realized that I was going to run 1:33, which is about what I had hoped I could do on a good day. And it felt like I had run a solid, well-paced race also, with the good-gait moments an added bonus.
***
It's been a long road these past 18 months or so since my neuro/dystonia stuff exploded in the fall of 2021. I'm still far from where I want to be, where I want to return to. But this is the first race I've run in quite some time where I felt really happy and satisfied when I finished.
As it turned out, my time ended up being fast enough to win the female masters award. I honestly wasn't expecting that, but that's how it worked out. And so I got to get called up on a stage and get handed an award. And it made me super happy because it was about the race and how fast I ran versus how fast others ran but it also felt like the encouragement I needed at just the right time.
When I was first really struggling with the dystonia, it seemed like every time I was at my worst this random older guy would approach me, running in the opposite direction, and yell something like "nice stride" or "good downhill technique" at me. Not in a sarcastic way, but in an honestly encouraging way. And it always seemed to be exactly what I needed to hear at that moment to pull me out of that funk. Winning this masters award felt very similar.
 |
| Thanks Universe. I needed this. |
Splits were:
Mile 1: 7:59 (ouch)
Mile 2: 7:22
Mile 3: 7:03
Mile 4: 6:58
Mile 5: 7:08 (I think this was the mile that had a few speed bumps to negotiate)
Mile 6: 7:14 (long)
Mile 7: 6:53 (short)
Mile 8: 7:02
Mile 9: 7:01
Mile 10: 7:03
Mile 11: 7:00
Mile 12: 6:58
Mile 13: 6:55
last bit: 45 seconds (6:50 pace)
Yeah, so I really need to fix this running in crowds thing. I want to run well at Cherry Blossom in a few weeks, and I will NOT be running solo in that race.
Other notes:
- The weather was mid-40s with no wind - perfect.
- I went ahead and wore tights to keep my legs warm, and a tank top with arm-warmers for the top. In years past this would have been a shorts race, but keeping my legs warm seems to help with the dystonia stuff.
- No caffeinated gels for this race - just normal Maurten.
- Since this race was so close to the Houston Marathon, I focused on tempo workouts and didn't do much in the way of long runs. I think this was the right choice given the timing, but I also felt that lack of long runs in the last 3 miles. I think another week of training with a long run would have done me good here.
- I stayed in downtown Hampton for this race and staying there and driving to the finish line on race morning worked wonderfully. I think I'll do that again next year.
- This is a wonderfully run race, and one I definitely want to return to.
- I took Route 17 back after the race instead of I-64 (good), but then made the mistake of trying to get onto I-95 south of Fredericksburg, instead of doing what I told other people to do (take 301 into Maryland or at least get on I-95 north of Fredericksburg. Lesson re-learned.
- I thought ahead and packed a bathing suit, towel, cap, and goggles, and then disciplined myself to drive directly to the pool for a quick swim instead of going home. Definitely the right call - my legs felt great post-swim, and not too bad the next day.
