This past weekend was the first of three big races for me
planned this spring, the NYC half marathon. The other two are Cherry Blossom 10
miler (2 weeks) and Pittsburgh Half (6 weeks). This was my first road race in
NYC, and while I’ve spectated a couple of Emily’s races in the last year, this
was a new experience for me. Also a new experience was getting into the elite
field of a big NYRR road race. I cannot say enough about their operation there;
Dave Monti, Sam Grotewold and their crew really run a tight ship and at the
risk of too many metaphors it ran like a Swiss watch as far as I could tell.
This will be a recap of most of our experience over the weekend as well as a
detailed race report.
Race Report
The weather race morning was cold and a noticeable north
wind. This would likely help the times out, since the back half of the course
runs straight down the west side highway and would be helped by the tailwind. I
put myself near the back of the elite field at the start. Broadly speaking, the
course was a 10k counter clockwise loop (or almost loop) around the main ring
road of central park, down 7th avenue through Times Square, west out
to the West Side Highway, and south down the highway, through the Battery Park
tunnel, up to the finish. The miles in Central Park were mostly rolling hills
and I linked up with a decently sized group for much of this. Myself and a local
Ethiopian ran side by side through miles 3-6 when we were joined by a couple
more guys, including Chris Bendtsen who I remembered from racing against Princeton.
Once we got out of the park and into the city streets, we packed up and worked
together to combat the headwind on the stretch getting to the WSH. Once we got
to the highway and turned south, it became a real race with the tailwind and
everybody just ran to their fitness level. I got dropped by the group around
mile 9. A few minutes later the Ethiopian pulled up with what looked like a
side stitch and I went by him. That would be the last guy I would pass. For the
rest of the race it was just about running right on the ragged edge. Coming out
of the tunnel was the 400m to go sign and two turns later there was the finish.
Positives: I was very nervous going into this race that I
wouldn’t have “the right stuff” anymore when it came to digging deep and
getting 100% out of my body during the race when it counted. It had been so
long since I last ran truly flat-out on a good day (Broad Street of last year)
that I was worried I might have forgotten what it was like. I also believe I
managed my effort pretty much perfectly throughout the race and was always in a
good spot. The first 10k in the park was hard but controlled, working the hills
and trying to relax and maintain focus on the downhills. Once we got onto the
WSH with the exposed tailwind and hit mile 9 the hammer was down for everyone
and we just ran as hard as we could. This good effort management is reflected
in my splits:
1st 5k: 5:14 pace (slowest segment, with rolling
hills into the wind)
2nd 5k: 5:13 pace (still rolling hills, but
mostly with the tailwind)
3rd 5k: 5:04 pace (fastest segment of the race;
net downhill from the park to the WSH)
4th 5k: 5:06 pace (straight down the WSH running
on the redline)
Last 1.1K: 5:05 pace (whatever was left)
I was also happy with my taper for this race. I felt very
good in the 3 days before, and part of that was probably due to nerves and
general jumpiness but also due to a slightly longer and more gradual taper. I
trust in the background of work over the last 3-4 months that I won’t “lose
fitness” by taking training a little easier for the 7-10 days before a really
big race. This kind of insecurity is something I’ve always struggled with and
is one of the main reasons I think top athletes need coaches.
Negatives: Put simply, I’m not in the kind of shape I hoped
I was in. In hindsight this should have been pretty clear; despite running good
mileage and having a good workout progression since December, the background of
shorter speed (two springs ago, I was coming off of 3:50 1500m/14:05 5000m
fitness) and overall uninterrupted quality and quantity hasn’t been there in
the long term. More importantly in the only real test race I had at Club
Challenge I ran slower in a losing effort this year. I had hoped that I would
come around in a big-time race and that on the day with a good taper I might
have something special, but like pretty much my entire career it’s very
predictable to a trained eye looking at the training. Looking at the splits and
remembering how the race felt, I don’t think there is any single aspect of
fitness that I’m lacking relative to anything else. I just need to keep working
on overall specific fitness, both underdistance and overdistance work to keep
getting in better 50-65 minute racing shape. Hopefully this race will be a big
stimulus for the next few weeks and I can have a solid outing at Cherry Blossom
and Pittsburgh, but for now the focus is on recovery and getting back into
training smartly and with an eye towards Cherry Blossom, less than 2 weeks
away.
For the immediate future, I’ll probably get in a workout
this week, maybe Thursday, which will be by feel and definitely without pushing
too hard. Something longer on Sunday, but again not anything super strenuous,
then the usual taper routine and midweek workout on Wednesday.
Overall Trip Experience…Report
Emily and I left Baltimore on the train around 5 pm Friday
afternoon. We arrived at Penn station and, thanks to the race’s elite director
Dave Monti, got to the hotel easily on a short subway ride. We dropped off our
bags and got a quick dinner spot from the front desk. Dinner was a Ramen place,
a typical tiny NYC basement eatery where we sat at the bar and watched two
young Asian guys crank out bowls of meat-and-noodle based soups.
The next day we got up, had breakfast in the hospitality
suite (penthouse of the hotel with great views) and went for our runs in
Central Park. This hotel had a great location just three short blocks away from
the park, so even with the snow still on the sidewalks it was an easy jog over.
Apparently it was a popular time for the elites to get in their pre-race runs
because I saw guys like Callum Hawkins, Chris Derrick, Amy Cragg and others I
didn’t recognize out there.
After an easy run and strides we hung out in the hotel and
watched some March Madness until lunch. Emily and I both went up and while I
checked in and got my finances straightened out she had lunch and headed out to
meet her sister and brother in law at the movies. I went to the bank, came back
and went to the USADA meeting followed by the race technical meeting. We all
had to sit through lots of lecturing and talking about the race details. After I got out of there, I met Emily, her
sister and husband for dinner at a place near Central Park. Pretty good spot,
could have been a really expensive dinner but we stuck to burgers. By the time
we got out of there it was getting late and we just headed back to the hotel
and tried to get to sleep early.
I never sleep well before races and I was especially nervous
for this one, so I tossed and turned all night and finally woke up 1 minute
before my 5 am alarm. I headed up to the suite to get some breakfast and got my
stuff together for the 6 am bus departure. Short bus ride but long walk through
security to get to the elite staging area. Hung around for not too long before
we had to go warm up; even though our race started at 7:30 we were to be at the
line (with our warmups on, thank God) just after 7. I warmed up with Jared Ward
and Noah Droddy and had a funny exchange in which Noah told us he wasn’t even
getting free shoes so he had to wear old, beat-up flats. Jared told him he
should at least be getting free gear…this proved especially prescient after the
race was over.
I wrote a detailed race report above, so I’ll skip that here.
After the race, Emily found me immediately and we made our way to the India
House, a restaurant near the finish that served as the VIP area. I got some
coffee and food here and went for a short, pretty painful cooldown with a few
other guys from the elite field. We got on the first bus back to the hotel,
which took seemingly forever due to the combination of race fatigue and
Manhattan traffic. I had a rough period of feeling really sore and drained once
we got back to the hotel but after Emily we walked to St. Patrick’s Cathedral
for church at noon, which was a pretty amazing building inside and out. We got
back to the hotel, packed up all our stuff and eventually left from the lobby
as a big group to the post-race lunch.
This lunch was one of the most surreal and fun race-related
social events I have ever been to. Surreal in that Emily and I got to rub
elbows with some of the elite athletes in our sport and talk to them as regular
people, and fun because the food and wine was never ending and was all comped. Sitting
at a table with Olympians and record holders from around the world was fun and
cool, I’ll leave it at that.
After lunch Emily and I headed for Penn Station, just a few
blocks away, and went home our separate ways. She was going to her parent’s
house and I was headed back to Baltimore so I had a 2.5 hour train ride to sink
back into fatigue and enjoy some quiet before being back in the real world.
