Sub-4 Marathon

The app has crapped itself (or my phone)

Just over 5 I think

Apparently Brighton have admitted the course was 560m long today, that’s at least 3 minutes at 3 hour nearly. You’d be gutted if it cost you a GFA or PB or something.

Especially as you often add distance from not following the blue line.

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How much extra?! FMD

That’s nuts. A hundred meters maybe but not half a kilometer

Great to meet you today @joex , sorry to see it didn’t go to plan. I lost you at the water station around 10k, I saw some gaps and went for them and before I knew it I was running almost 1 min/km quicker than planned, and decided to roll with it. I certainly paid for it, I knew at about 18 miles things were going to get painful and by 20 miles, I was definitely in the pain cave.

Official time of 3:49:19 so much faster that I’d planned & a lot more uncomfortable than planned, but still 6 mins off my PB.

Think I need to reset expectations for London, 4:30 defintiely off the table.

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You can still get to 4:30, eat a lot of pies, you could stop training too but that would just make it even more uncomfortable? Or maybe just the discipline not to go 1min/km quicker than planned!

Sorry it didn’t go right Joe - hot and humid there too presumably?

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Opps, obviousy not with it. My other schoolboy error (in addition to the pacing) was lack of suntan lotion. Wearing a club vest, my shoulders and upper arms properly tingling now :face_with_hand_over_mouth:

Will have to see how I recover, maybe 4:30 will be ambitious!

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I’m confused.

You went 3:49 today?

Why not 4:30 in 3 weeks?

Amateurs!

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Yes indeed, the first hour or so flew by :slightly_smiling_face: Well done​:+1:

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Good work! :clap:t4:

No, and I’m not sure I was ever on track in what seems to be an exact repeat of my 2019.

@badash and I started with the 4hr markers a fair distance ahead so we though we’d track a little fast to slowly catch them up which made sense to me, but my watch kept giving kilometre splits that were much faster. I wasn’t sure whether to trust the watch or not - PacePro had advised a 5:59 first km then basically 5:41-5:43 for the rest of the race for a 3:59, but there were times I was showing 5:20/km and the 4hr guys were getting no closer. When I finished my watch said I’d set a 4:50 kilometre somewhere in the mix…!

But if @jeffb is right and they have already admitted it, then maybe my watch was right - I had 43.14km at the end (plus the 1.5km loop they make you walk away from the finish and back to the pier :wink: )

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They seem to be fessing up on social media, a few of the comments I think reckoned between miles 9 & 10, but don’t quote me on that.

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I don’t get how they over measure a marathon that’s been held for over 10 years?

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That’s a shame mate, what time did you do? Because on paper it looked pretty good to me in the run up?

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Somewhere around mile 12 a guy was lying out spreadeagled on the side of the road loudly declaring what seemed to be some sort of epiphany he was having while a small crowd where trying to ask him if he was okay ā€œYou need to know what’ important in life! And what’s important isā€¦ā€ I figured he had people around him…

Then my family appeared ā€œfrom nowhereā€ we had agreed they would be at mile 14 and this was still mile 12, but this was a welcome boost and I hurriedly gave them kisses/hugs/handshakes and bounded on my way through the half marathon arch. I deliberately did not look at my watch*. 1) As above I wasn’t sure it was tracking well 2) If it’s too fast it bad news, if its too slow, it’s also bad news!

*This is also why I’m talking miles when I always otherwise talk kilometres.

Still felt good, breathing easy like every four paces on the flat, every two on the uphill. I’d drank at every aid station, and got two gels inside me. Mile 14 was where I started to deteriorate in 2019 so passing there feeling good was a good sign…or so I thought because pretty much around then I started to fall apart and it was pretty quick this time and comprehensive; slowing then a slight feeling of dizziness, stitch started rising, all the supporting muscles started stiffening up - I tried to lift my knees to force better form and immediately felt the onset of cramp in my left calf…so sadly around 2h20-2h27 I fully detonated. šŸƒšŸ»ā€ā™‚ļøšŸ’„Walking was painful.

This has happened to me so many times before it was definitely disheartening but there was no attempt to push through. I backed off to a walk and decided to wait until I felt good enough to run. I took in as much water as I possibly could at the next two aid stations and after letting it settle for a good while I got jogging again, but I couldn’t hold it. My heart rate was getting into the 140s for like 7-8min/km pace, which wasn’t encouraging.

So then the maths starts…I’ve got 10 miles to go (ffs) how the heck am I going to get there. 1) Can it. 2) Just walk the lot. 3) Keep trying to push. Well my phone had blown up as well :telephone_receiver::boom:, sometime before I did so I couldn’t call the family to pick me up so I settled on 3 and my body settled on 2 so we had some fun getting to mile 20.

Mile 20-22 and the roadside bodies were starting to pile up - quite literally I fear in some cases. A flurry of ambulances, not just the stern bike ambulance, but three full on ambulances with the engines revving and the blues and twos barging everyone on to the side walk. Whatever was going on looked pretty serious and we saw them come back the other way - as I was trying to dive in to a toilet, I was also diving for cover as they screeched around the corner! :ambulance::ambulance::ambulance:

The last four miles were carnage, I did the maths on a 5k could I just hold this pace for 30 minutes surely, surely? Right? Then I might be able to finish in x hours? No - I was going insane - 8:00/km was out of my grasp for more than a few hundred metres. But the smiling faces and encouragement was never ending, and had me laughing at times - I was physically in a deep hole but mentally (for once) I was merely disappointed. Small victories! :laughing:

Eventually I had started looking at my watch and getting paces trying to find a holdable jog, and after some mild success I was I had just over 2km to go and that was enough to get into a sustainable shuffle…of course that turned out to be 3km but by then it was too late I had to continue! The finish line loomed, loads of people screaming and all of a sudden I saw my family cheering from the Grandstand, I blew them kisses - I could’ve cried I think - the compĆØre gave me some commentary on the celebrations and despite knowing I was over 5hrs I was genuinely celebrating across the line 🄲

I kept walking and congratulated some of the athletes around me, started talking to one guy who swore he’d never do another…except somehow he’s already signed up for the next two years…and a young lady I was offering help to ā€œNo, I’m all right just drank too much water!ā€ All perky like, then projectile vomited green on the floor again :face_vomiting:

Marathons are mad. If you ever see me on the 2022 version of this thread, kick me hard in the nuts repeatedly until I delete my posts and set it to Ignore. :face_with_head_bandage:.

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Cheers, I’m just looking it up - phone bust and not charging so scuppered me totally. Took 1h30 to find my family after the race!

Edit:
The splits don’t make any sense at all, but it’s saying 5h07 for the finish…so I think I can put sub13 at Barcelona in the bin. I reckon my time to the half was okay. Probably under 2h, possibly too far under 2h.

My watch had a 4h02 prediction this morning, it’s set a record of 5h on the dot for the marathon, so now Garmin has revisited it’s marathon prediction to…3h48 :smiley: :rofl:

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Ooh that sounds like a rough day out mate but take heart that you took option C and carried on. If you feel like ever signing up for another, let me know, I’d happily pace along with you. :+1:

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Well done for keeping going, and Badash.

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A real kick in the teeth was passing the 25 mile marker and then seeing a blue ā€œfinishingā€ arch in the far in the distance, but as I got closer I realised it the the half way arch in the other side of the road :joy: the actually finishing arch must have been almost another km further 🄲

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