Grandma's Marathon Recap! Part 1

Race day has now come and gone. We spent the last four plus months preparing for this one big day. It's quite nerve racking to think that all that hard work leading up to the big race could all be for nothing if the day doesn't pan out the way you hope it will.  Thankfully, that wasn't the case for us and thankfully, that's not usually the case. Typically, when you put in the hard work, the results will follow.

We left Springfield Thursday morning and drove all the way to Duluth, MN where the Grandma's Marathon is held. We did stop a few times along the way.  One of our first stops was simply to get some lunch at the wonderful Subway!  Oh how we love Subway!  Then we headed up the road to an outlet mall just north of Minneapolis to do some walking around.  While in this little town, we found a running trail to do a short 2 mile run with some 20 sec strides.  Much to my surprise, this run actually went well. I thought we would feel terrible after 9 hours in a car. After the run, we jumped back in the car and finished up the remaining 2 hours to Superior, Wisconsin (which is where we were staying-in the dorms at UW-Superior).

We slept in just a bit on Friday to make sure we would be plenty rested. Then we went to the running trail that is right along the coast of Lake Superior to do another 2 mile easy run with only four 20 sec strides this time. The temperatures were a bit on the cool side on Friday. When we woke up that morning, temperatures were about 44 degrees with a wind chill in the upper 30's. Brr.  We then spent a good portion of the day going to packet pick up and just hanging out at the dorms relaxing. We topped off the evening by eating at Olive Garden.  We assumed it would be crazy busy so we went to eat early (5:30 ish) and still had to wait over an hour to get seated. It was definitely worth it, however.

Race day was just about 12 hours away now and we knew we were going to have to get up early the next morning to get our pre-race meal taken care of 3 hours prior to the start. So when 4:45am rolled around, we got up, ate our bagels with peanut butter and walked over to the bus stop to get on our bus. The Grandma's Marathon is a point to point race meaning they bus you out 26.2 miles from the finish and have you run the entire way back to the city.  With this being my second year in a row running this race, I knew exactly how to handle the starting area which gave me a little more sense of calm prior to the start.

1 hour prior to the race

 All the restroom stops taken care of, and the final few sips of water completed, I headed to the start line to meet up with Kimi (She was able to drop her stuff at the elite drop area so we had to go to separate areas prior to the start of the race). We lined up and Kimi was just about 10 rows of people in front of me in the 'Elite' corral but none of that matters as soon as the starting gun goes off.  It took me about a mile to get fully caught up to Kimi.  I stayed with Kimi for the first 10 miles. We were clipping off mile after mile right at about 6:05-6:10 pace and were feeling pretty good.  So far, it simply felt like we were doing a long tempo run together.  At mile 7 I told her that I would stay with her through 10 miles and then I was going to try and get caught back up to the 6 min per mile average that I was hoping to break. We crossed 10 miles in 61:10 so I knew we were averaging 6:07.  My goal at that point was to try and get the average down to 6  minutes by the time I hit 20 miles. At this point, I knew I needed to average 5:53 per mile to accomplish that task. Mile after mile clicked off and I couldn't quite get the pace down below 5:53 except for maybe one or two miles which clicked off about 5:52.  At 20 miles in, I still needed to make up about 40 seconds.  I kept the legs churning hoping that I might be able to get the pace back down for the final 3 miles or so which would still give me a chance. I came through 23 miles this year and was exactly 30 seconds over pace.  All I needed was a 5:50 average for the final 5k to get exactly 6 minute pace. Unfortunately, I just didn't quite have enough to get that done. I did however, hold it together much better this year than I did the year before which allowed me to run a new personal best by 1 minute and 45 seconds.  All in all I was quite pleased with my performance.

As soon as I crossed the finish line, I waited around to see how Kimi would finish up.  This is where the nerves really set in.  The unknown for how she would do over the remaining 16 miles since the point where I left her was quite suspenseful.  I was watching the clock and watching the runners coming in. You can see the runners for about the last 2 tenths of a mile headed straight to the finish line. I quickly picked out Kimi's stride and jersey colors. I was stoked. She had about 2 minutes cushion to complete the remaining 2 tenths. I started cheering and waving my hat trying to bring her to the finish!  I get tears of joy just thinking about her accomplishment. She worked extremely hard to get to where she is now and to see it pay off is just awesome!  Kimi's time ended up being 2:41:54 which is under the Olympic Trials B standard by a minute and 6 seconds.

My Goal: sub 6 minute pace
Actual: 6:02/mile 2:38:05
Kimi's Goal: Sub 2:43:00 (Olympic Trials B Standard)
Kimi's Actual: 2:41:54 - Successful!