Chasing the elusive 3:10

A few days before the Chicago marathon I woke up dreaming that I was wearing the famed blue singlet with "Boston Athletic Association" on it. I was on Heartbreak Hill pounding my way to the finish line. Last Sunday, I was at the start line of another great marathon in downtown Chicago feeling a bit nervous but confident of all those grueling training sessions I had put in. The long runs in freezing cold winter and the tempo runs and track workouts even in 100+ degree Baltimore heat should pay off, right? Nada. Doesn't matter. All that matters is what you do after the starter gun goes off. Dreams don't count, passion is only for the movies, and certainly no extra points for sucking up the IT band pain in Chinatown (mile 21) and continuing to run. You either make it or end up 10 minutes late -- 3:20:54.

*Wisconsin was a training run

As a runner the best you can hope for is continuous improvement. Goals change but training never ends. Looking back on all the marathons I've done in a year, all I have is to look forward to the next marathon knowing that my qualifying time might just be a marathon away. Or two.

Why do I want to qualify? 3:10 seems like an arbitrary goal. Why not 3:00 or even 2:50? Preparing and running for a BQ to me has been much more than that. It is knowing what I'm made of. It was the same thing that made me run a 50 miler in June.

Back in the game!

Today's 8 mile run in the morning was more than that. It was to test if I still had it in me to meet my expectations. The run was an exercise that I call "Speed Game" for lack of ideas. (Speed Play is already taken -- aka Fartlek.) I broke the run into several components including a progression and a tempo run with sprints added in between. At the end of the tempo run were couple of surge exercises to simulate the race finish line conditions. I met all planned goals and my legs feel great. Irrespective of my original race goal for Chicago and my recent setbacks, I now feel very confident to put a decent show. The days following will be mellow but calculated.

In more Chicago news, my corral assignment got messed up and I recently found out that I will be running in the "OPEN" category. Apparently, their "system" will not allow changes now. WTF! To give a perspective, Chicago is not like your ordinary city marathon -- with tens of thousands of runners, a bad corral assignment or the worst case ("OPEN") like mine, would mean slow milling for the first few miles from start. Also, all the dodging slow runners etc will take energy that could have been well spent racing. Bad race strategy but can't do much about it other than trying to be there early and have a wider negative split.

Training update: Last week

Training for Chicago is unlike anything I have done before. For the first time, I'm running according to a plan. Unlike standard template plans that spans 16 weeks or so that don't respond to your training, I'm taking my training on a week by week basis.

The other big change for me is running in Baltimore during summer. For the past 3 years, I've managed to escape to San Francisco during summer but this time I've to be here to make "progress" on my thesis. Running in 90+ degrees heat is a different experience and high intensity training is especially challenging. More updates on that soon.