The plan for today was to get a sufficient BQ time that I can use for 2025, since my time from Chicago surely will not be anywhere near close enough to sufficient. And my stretch goal was to get a time I can use to qualify for New York 2025.
And this past week has seen pretty darn cold temps in the morning, getting only into the low or mid 50s for the high. You'd think that was a good recipe.
Well, as predicted earlier in the week, rain came through last night and the temps were WARM today. We started the day in Chesapeake at about 61F and it went up to about 65-70F. Oh, and the humidity, as I discovered last night, was 90% for the entire time. Dismal Swamp, indeed. Ugh!
That weather is a recipe for my not being capable to hitting a fast time. And that proved to be correct again today.
I arrived early, signed in to get my bib (small enough race where they have you pick up your bib before the start of the race), and braced myself. A few minutes before race start, I remembered that I had turned off the GPS on my watch for the treadmill running (since it has been screwy otherwise, indoors, lately), so I switched it back. And then, when trying to set it for the outdoor run, it froze. With 1 minute before race time. And this process ALWAYS takes multiple minutes to proceed. I kick it off, but it was nowhere near finishing by the time the starter was counting down from 10 seconds. F*ck it, Murphy was going to be with me for the full day, apparently -- both for conditions and pacing.
We set off shortly before sunrise (at 6:45am -- 45 minutes after the 100k race started) and very quickly I fell in with two guys a little younger than me. I asked them what they were shooting for -- 3:15. Perfect! I'd stick with them, especially since I have no functioning watch to check my pace. (And this is a small enough race where the only clock on the course is at the start/mid-point/finish line.)
Well, so much for THAT plan. During the first two miles, they compare the times on their respective Garmin's (7:00 and 7:20 -- hmm...). Not only were the temps too hot, but so was the pace, regardless of which was accurate. And I tend to think it was closer to 7:00. There were LOTS of pockets of hotter/more humid air, and a few pockets of cooler air. (No, not breezes.) This made it all the worse, when we ran through the hotter air. Somewhere between Mile 2-3, I slowly lost pace compared to them. I didn't even try to keep up, since doing so would have been disastrous for me.
Once it was light enough out, I was able to read the markings on the mileage markers -- every .25 miles. So, I was able to do the calculations of what my pace was a few times. Suffice to say, by the time I hit half-way, I was 5 minutes off that pace (10 minutes off full time - and that compared to my BQ time, not my desired time). Strangely enough, while I did see them shortly after the first turn-around, quickly thanked them for their efforts and said it wasn't in the cards for me today, I never saw them again (and we should have crossed two more times). I don't know if it's just because I didn't recognize them separately (two guys in black t-shirts weren't with each other again), or they dropped. I'm hoping it's the former, but I can't get to the results page to try to find their results.
My final time on the day: 3:52:57. Empirically a good time, but atrocious compared to my goal for the day.
The logistics for this race were very different than what I'm used to. They had one sizable food/drink tent at the start area (I didn't really recognize it as available during the race, though it was) and two drink stations set up en route to the 6.55 mile turn-around point. Out and back on a super-flat course, twice. And, scuttlebutt was that they made sure to do the necessary paperwork to get it certified as an Olympic qualifying race because there was one lady who was trying to qualify at it -- approx 6 minute pace was what she was looking for. I figured that there would be a timing mat or some race official at the turnaround point -- something to prove that all of us actually did the distance on each lap. But no. The only mat was at the start line, so only 3 splits were recorded (start, half, and finish). But, apparently, there is no needed for such an interim mat for the course to be certified. Bizarre, but them's the rules.
The water stations themselves were VERY short. Basically one table with about 2-4 people at them, each one with two cups -- one water and one Gatorade. They asked you on your approach which you wanted, and they held out the correct cup. A little tricky on the first station given there was enough of a clump of runners, but certainly no issues after that.
I was QUITE happy with the post-race food they had available. In addition to lots of bottles of different flavors of Gatorade, and water, they had pizza (cheese and pepperoni), pretzels, M&Ms, Skittles, Rice Krispie treats, different types of granola bars, and probably a couple of other things. This was presumably more intended variety-wise for the food that the 100k runners would need for fueling throughout their race, though it was gladly offered up for the marathoners.
UPDATE: The race results (and race photos) are finally available on the website (now two days later), and I was able to find the bib numbers for the two men I was running with. One of them smashed his 3:15 goal and was in under 3:13 -- and was first in his age group! The other (if I am seeing things correctly) looks like he didn't finish, as I'm not seeing the bib number in the results, nor a finish line photo (where there are a few other photos for him). So, clearly my not seeing the two of them after that first turnaround was partly me and partly not. :-)
