A quick comparison of the miles in my last 2 marathons. Columbus looks odd in that my Garmin had trouble starting up at the beginning of the marathon. The last .2 is missing and I did not take a 12.50 pace to finish the 1st mile. Also, I turned off my Garmin a little late after the marathon, so if I really wanted to, I could trim off about 37 seconds on the last ".28" of RnR.
It seems that I don't ever remember details about the race. I am always amazed about how people can talk about their marathon mile by mile. But here is a little bit of what I do remember.
I always have to pee relatively soon into the marathon. It doesn't matter how much I use the porta potty prior, I just have to go after moving. It must be nerves or something because it doesn't happen during training.
I was also going a little too fast the first miles. My pace should have been 8:23 and I had quite a few miles faster than that. The fact that a friend of mine was able to run the same pace and was talking rather comfortably to others as well should have been a warning sign. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't breathing TOO hard, it just felt a little closer to half marathon pace breathing than marathon pace breathing.
The marathon course for RnR Az is much less impressive than the 1/2 marathon in my opinion. There was some beautiful areas but the crowds and the music was much better when I ran the 1/2 in '08.
For the first time in a marathon, my mom and Dan (her husband, who we love) got to see me run. In fact she grabbed a photo of me.
I think it's good that you can pick out things that are consistent - starting out too fast, having to use the porto. These are things you can factor in at your next race. I think you should give Columbus another shot. :) It's in October and I thought that it was really good this year. Just a thought!
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