i know some of our 200mile december challenge were running disney yesterday. lets hear how the challenge helped
Not a 200 miler, it was my first race since recovering from chronic achilles tendonitis. I was glad to finish the half injury free, I was pretty slow, but had a great time.
Good, for 23.5 miles!
I was trying to BQ and ran what I thought was a conservative pace for my time. Took the first mile out in an easy 7:45 dodging a ton of people that started at the front of the A corral and were running 10 minute miles with their headphones on, then ran the next 11 or so in ~7:15 pace. Had one potty break about mile 9 but still managed a 7:30 for that mile. I picked it up just a little about halfway and ran miles 12-18 in the low 7’s, which was right on my goal pace. I hit the half in 1:35 or so and it felt easy up to then. My plan was to run until I found the 3:10 group then stay with them but I came across one guy that was running a 3:10 pace around mile 15-16 and he said the 3:10 group was about 2-3 minutes up the road. I eventually caught up to where they were about 30 seconds in front of me and just kind of stayed there.
I started to tighten up in my left quad around mile 18-19 but was still able to comfortably run 7:30 or thereabouts pace. I hit mile 20 in 2:25 and change which put me on a 3:10 pace or so. Miles 21-23 my left quad really started to tighten up and about halfway through mile 23 I had a full blown locked up leg! I hobbled the last 2+ miles in to a 3:21.
I was frustrated with missing the BQ time but I was happy that other than my quad cramp the race felt easy right up to mile 20+. For miles 10-20 I felt I was holding back yet I kept running low 7’s and I think my fastest mile was 12 or 13 in the upper 6’s. During that stretch from miles 12-20 I thought about picking up the pace a little but I didn’t as I was trying to save energy for my BQ time. So although I didn’t qualify I took from it that my race fitness/run is improving immensely as other than the cramp at the end the low 7 minute miles just seemed to tick by one after another without much effort. I was also happy that after things settled down after a couple of miles I only got passed by 2-3 people but passed a ton myself.
Overall the race was a fun experience. There are some boring stretches as others have mentioned between parks but the atmosphere, fireworks at the start, running through the parks with the staff and characters and the bands on the lonely stretches made it a really fun race. The only thing(s) I could complain about is that it starts flippin early (I got on my shuttle from the hotel at 3am).
My wife and I made a vacation out of it with the kids so we stayed in a resort hotel and hit the parks in the days up to the race. Walking around, standing in line and carrying my 3yo daughter all over the park Thurs-Sat probably didn’t help my legs rest now that I think about it!
Great job! I would be thrilled with even breaking 3:30 and you hobble across the line in 3:20. outstanding.
would you say the challenge was a big help?
Yes, it was a ton of help.
My biggest month ever (in 2 years of racing) was about 140 or so miles. I did 250 in December.
That was a huge boost and if it weren’t for the cramping I think I would have easily been under BQ time (3:15) and probably under 3:10 which a year ago was almost unimaginable for me.
In addition to my miles and miles of walking the days leading up to the race I also think the fact that they had poweraid on course and I trained with Gatoraide endurance probably hurt me too. I don’t think I drank enough poweraide during the run as, well, I simply don’t like it! Plus I didn’t have any salt tabs either so that was my goof.
right on. well great job nonetheless