So I ran my first marathon…
So that is me freezing my ass off before the race began. It was -2 degrees Celsius, it was fucking cold. I would like to first say that this marathon has to be one of the prettiest, if not THE prettiest marathons in Japan. I mean November 30th, so it is still fall time frame, leaves have changed to falls colors (which is always a a beautiful sight), I ran a the Kawwaguchi Lake, so the water was calm, cool, blue and clear, a snow capped Fujisan (Mt. Fuji) was big, bold and proud. The marathon its’ self was very woody and green. It was a very scenic view. It’s called the Kawaguchi-Ko Marathon because you run around the Kawaguchi Lake twice. (The Ko part of Kawaguchi-Ko stands for lake.) Running around thelake is about ten miles, so you run about 10k (6 miles) out in town first, before you make two trips around the lake. In case you didn’t know a full marathon is 26.22 miles or 42.195 kilometers. I have ran in three 10-miler races before. Actually my last one was about two months ago in Washington D.C. Most people move to the half-marathon before taking on the whole 26.2. But I figured since I am already accustomed to 10 miles, which is close enough to 13.1, I might as well jump straight into a full marathon. I was completely undertrained. I trained to 20 miles on my long runs, but honestly I wasn’t running like I should have. I was being fucking lazy. Soooooooo, when it came to game time, I felt it. I was expecting a 3 hour 30 minute marathon ( I took in consideration to the fact that I was undertrained, I knew going in I didn’t train well enough), But I ran a 3 hour 40 minute time (which is like a 8:26 min/mile pace). 26.2 miles is the longest I have ever ran in one time in my life. The previous longest length was 21 miles. I would say finishing this marathon without stopping and walking is one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life. But now I know how my body feels after a distance like that. It was a good learning experience. Now I have to get ready for the Tokyo Marathon. More than 200,000 people registered for the Tokyo Marathon, almost 7 times the amount of slots available. I was lucky enough to receive a slot. So I feel it would be a shame not to train to my fullest, know that somebody else could have easily took my slot. I don’t want to be that person who undertrained and ran a flat marathon, when somebody else could have took my slot and ran theirPR. So I am committed, I will post my traininglog soon (hopefully, sometime this month). That way it keeps me honest. Today I ran a beautiful 8 mile tempo. I am really feeling strong since the Kawaguchi Marathon. I first goal for the Tokyo Marathon is 3:10:59, which would qualify me for the Boston Marathon in 2011. My second goal is 2:59:59, under three hours, I WILL reach that in some point in my lifetime. And my third and final goal for Tokyo is 2:55:00, I think if I train right it shouldn’t be out of reach. Keep in mind my fastest 10-miler was 1:03:24 (which is like a 6:20 min/mile pace). Anyways, I will have another post soon of the Gorilla Biscuits show I took video of in Tokyo two days ago, so keep checking for that. I am just putting is out I have had over 2,200 hits to this blog since I started it back in July, not too bad and not too good. Lately, I have had a lot more recent hits, keep ‘em coming, and please read. I don’t blogeveryday (at a minimum once a month), but I do have a lot of content up. Just check it out and tell me what you think. Also check out all the shit I have under my “blogroll”. I have other bloggers and various websites you may be interested in. Anyways as always more pictures on Kawaguchi and my son and peace for now.
1 Comment
September 7, 2009 at 6:10 am
Thanks for the post. Am training for Kawaguchi ko full marathon at the moment having done Tokyo in March. I was surprised to read your times considering you said you didn’t do much training and it was your first full marathon. Really well done! Boston is a personal goal of mine but having done Tokyo (my first) in 3:53 I’m a long way off qualifying. I’d be interested in seeing your training log. Are you still in Japan?