This year's San Francisco marathon was a big learning experience for me. Going into it, I honestly didn't expect to finish. I was undertrained by about 40 miles (buying a house had cut into some of my shorter runs) and felt I had peaked in my training way too early. To top it all off, I blew out both knees on my last 20 miler, mostly due to quads weakened from moving our shit up and down three flights of stairs the prior weekend.
Nevertheless, we had a four day weekend and a trip to Big Sur planned, so skipping the trip was not an option.
Dr B had offered a while ago to come to San Francisco with me for this one, and I'm so glad he did. Having him there to support me before, during and after the race made a huge difference.
By the time we reached the expo, I was KT taped to the hilt and wearing two knee braces. I picked up my swag with humility, fully expecting to DNF. The expo itself was fine, in Fort Mason and well enough organized. I'm not a huge fan of expos generally, but I wanted to get the most out of the experience just in case I managed to finish.
Back at the San Remo hostel, we went to bed pretty early on stomachs full of pasta from Fior d'Italia downstairs. I'd gone for simple penne with fresh tomato and shallot. No funny business. I know better than to mess with my stomach the night before a long run. Mostly.
Race Day:
At 4 am we got up, I ate my bagel with peanut butter and banana and took a naproxen. I had been hitting the naproxen consistently for about a week before race to reduce inflammation in my knees, as well as icing, stretching and foam rolling. I felt no actual pain, which made me hopeful as we walked in the dark through North Beach towards the Ferry Building. As we neared the area, hundreds of runners were streaming in from all directions. I began to get a lump in my throat. It was freaking awesome. The Bay Bridge was twinkling and the air was warm.
The start line was chaotic. 25,000 people can't all leave the start line at the same time, and it took me about 10 or 15 minutes to find/walk all the way to where wave 5 was waiting. We had just enough time to watch the elites take off before I had to get in my corral. Dr B walked along the fence next to me as we progressed. I silently repeated my mantras: "walk the hills." "stop before the pain." "slow and steady finishes the race." It was hugely difficult to go from aiming for a marathon PR to just hoping to finish, but I knew that this too was part of being a disciplined runner. I also bet on being able to tell the moment right before I blew out my knees again, and planned to ease off every time I felt it approaching that threshold. Well, our wave left at 6:02 and it was maybe 6:22 that I began to worry. I was running a very "safe" 10-11 minute mile and hardly even sweating along the Wharf, with quick breaks to stretch my quads. In the mostly flat Portland marathon, I saw hardly anyone stopping to stretch, but in SF, the road's shoulders were crowded with neon-clad runners bending a leg up behind them like dorky flamingos.
Until the climb to the bridge, I was too busy listening to my body to listen to my podcast. I run in headphones, but always low enough to hear traffic and voices around me. I can't remember most of what I listened to that day, except a couple of particularly well-times songs (for example, The Cult's "Sanctuary" while running down Haight) but I remember every mile the intensity of discomfort or pain in my knees. As my little pack approached the misty bridge, I had a few minutes of normal running in an epic setting. I passed the hugely inspirational and positive ultrarunner Ginger Runner going the other way and yelled out "Go Ginger!" and he yelled back "woo hoo!" That kind of perked me up a bit, and I continued the long and beautiful out-and-back on the bridge.
In Marin, the line for the port a potties was again ridiculously long (what are you people doing in there for so long?!) so I took a moment to stretch. I felt okay but was still not sure how I would feel by the time I reached my husband in Golden Gate Park, who had taken a spectator bus to the halfway point and had been texting with me every mile or so. When I was climbing through the Presidio, I found out he was at mile 18 and seeing "a lot of busted runners." With dismay, I told him "I might not make it to 18." Looking back, I almost think it is harder to run slower than usual than to run faster than you normally do - I felt intense pressure to keep up with other runners. That is the absolute wrongest move to make in marathon running at my level, for many reasons, number one being that you NEVER KNOW what someone has gone through to get to that point. That fat chick in the tutu might be one of the toughest motherfuckers out there, and the guy who fell to his knees and appeared to be thanking the heavens for his mid-pack half marathon finish could've just defeated cancer or who knows what else. We don't all wear our excuses on our shirts ("busted knees"), and that's why it doesn't matter what anyone else around you is doing and the only one judging you that matters is you. I was able to tell myself this walking down some steep downhills to the park, but really mostly kept myself going from pride. I was a hot mess when I reached him and he walked along side me a bit and I updated him. I was fine from the waist up and barely sweating: the rest was just bad. I always laugh at people on shows like Survivor who break down in tears at the sight of their loved ones after 25 days on a freaking game show - I get it now.
I made the call to keep going after seeing him, since I could still put one foot in front of the other, but never at any point did I feel confident that I was going to actually finish until I could see the Bay Bridge from the industrial area. Haight Ashbury had been miserable - where I had once planned to fly down those hills and make up lost time, I was now almost tiptoeing. The uphill back to Potrero was a much needed relief. Soon after that intersection, I texted Dr B to see where he was - en route to the finish! That helped. At that point I knew that if I was very careful to listen to my knees I could probably walk the rest if I needed to. The problem was, I had been leapfrogging the 4:55 pacer guy for an hour or two and couldn't bear the thought of coming in over five hours. My goal during the race had changed from "just finish" to "just finish before that fucking guy." (Okay, so sometimes a little competition is healthy). The last section was surprisingly hot and I started trying to disassociate myself, which I hate to do in a scenic race I've spent a retarded amount of money on, but felt it was necessary. I turned my music up and zoned out. I began to pass a significant amount of people for the first time and felt like a runner again. I hit the finish line with everything I had. I collected my medal, and my husband collected me, and we carefully walked the 1.5 miles back to the hotel.
Aftermath:
My time when all was said and done was 4:59. I was within seconds of the dreaded five hour finish, which is another lesson in times being mostly just arbitrary judges of how you ran. If I had spent thirty more seconds in the port a potty would I have felt less worthy? No. That would be stupid. I know how hard what I did was and so does my husband, and that's all that really matters to me. That's almost as good in my head as a marathon PR. That does not mean, of course, that I don't want to come back and destroy this course. Those hills I power hiked are not harder than what I hike in the mountains, and I used to be good at running downhill (at least on trails). I think I can train to do that course in under four and a half, maybe closer to 4 if I can get those downhills under control.
I probably will NEVER do another race injured, because without the help of naproxen I likely wouldn't have started, and the naproxen probably contributed to a huge problem with my digestive system for 48 hours after the race. I developed what I'm 75% certain was ischemia (I'll let you Google that one) back at the hotel, which put me on the phone with the Kaiser advice nurse later that afternoon. She told me to go to urgent care, I didn't, and I'm fine. This is apparently a thing that happens to distance runners and can be serious, and in one noted marathon case, fatal. So kids - hydrate well and don't take NSAIDs and Red Bull before a marathon. I haven't been scared off endurance running, and I'm still hoping to complete an ultra, but if it happens again I will definitely be reconsidering.
Thoughts and tips:
- The marathon expo was fine and well organized. Parking seemed to be available. Not a ton of swag, but better than Portland.
- The spectator shuttles sold out quickly in preferred time slots, but were a cool feature. The California 1 MUNI line was a good alternative.
- Lines for port a potties were long, like really long.
- The starting corrals were really chaotic - there seemed to be the most confusion between corrals 4 thru 6. More signage would've been helpful.
- Photos are free this year and times were posted online by the evening. Cool.
- Shirts and medals are reasonably attractive.
- Aid stations were often depleted for us slower runners. Water wasn't getting filled fast enough, and tables were sometimes surprisingly bereft of Dixie cups, which sounds like a dick complaint about volunteers, but it was a thing.
- Compared to Portland, food was limited. I remember finally grabbing some Gu Chomps well into the race. It's fine because I carry my own nutrition, but it did seem somewhat sparse. I could be wrong about this, because I did not stop at every station.
- Okay, there were a couple moments where I was worried I had veered off course and was running part of the second half marathon that was going on concurrently - it gets a little hectic in Golden Gate park, but I was also a hot mess at that point so who knows.
- The rest of my complaints are old lady type shit about how freaking expensive SF is for a destination race. Our hotel had hard beds and shared bathrooms and still was pricey. AirbnB is probably your best bet. But you'll still bleed money (maybe thats what was happening to me after the race?!) Like, we went down to Big Sur the next day and I almost had a stroke dealing with the SFO Budget rental car people. I have rarely spent so much money in a short period of time. News flash: one of the best cities in the world is expensive. Fortunately, I got over it.
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Brooks Pure Cadence 2, half full Nathan hydration pack (I debated the handheld but decided to stick with how I'd trained on my long runs), Brooks Cap, cheapo sunglasses, a Nike running tank and well-worn REI leggings, 2 gels and Sports Beans. I used the Nuun supplied by the aide stations judiciously. Copious sunblock despite the foggy start. I was happy with my prep.
So that's it. It was brutal, I'm glad I did it, and this has been a hell of a year so far. Now, time to hike!
Some shots from our day trip to Big Sur:
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#TSFM2014 #thesanfranciscomarathon #sfmarathon #sanfrancisco #sanremohotel #bigsur #distancerunning
