The 18 mile tune up was a last minute decision for me. I mentioned this in my previous post. It turned out my friend and neighbor Tony was doing it, and the convenience of driving into the city with him and Wayne tipped the scales. Logically, it made more sense too. It’s a better race for training at this point.

Both Wayne and Tony planned to get there by 5:45 and do one extra lap of the park before the start of the race. That would make a total of 24 miles for them. Their planned early arrival would allow me enough time to register at nyrr on 89 street and make it to the start at 102nd st by 7am.

Sleeping the night before was surprisingly no problem. I passed out somewhere around 10 or 11 pm, and I slept almost straight through the night. I woke just once at 2:45 am and then again at 4:30 am. The alarm was set for 4:45, so I just got out of bed at that point.

After a quick breakfast, I threw on my running clothes. I almost forgot I was getting ready to race. It felt more like I had a pre-dawn training run planned. Since I didnt have a bib or dtag, it was like there was nothing to set off those pre-race jitters. It also occurred to me I had no idea or hint of a target time for this race. I imagined sub 7 minute miles would be a good target. 7:03 was the pace I did 3 years ago. Out of curiosity I used a race predictor and plugged in my Bronx half marathon time of 1:27:10 to see what the best I can expect to do would be. Heh, a 6:48 pace? No way. Best I felt I could hope for was 6:55 to 7:00.

At that point, I shut down the laptop, grabbed 3 gels, a cylinder of glucose tablets, a glucose shot, and ran out the door.

We drove in to the city, arrived, and parked in a secret location near 102nd street. Tony and Wayne decided to do their extra loop clockwise, which was opposite of the race direction, but in the direction of nyrr. We made our way over together and I said good bye to them as I exited the park through the engineering gate.

Made my way to NYRR and there were lots of people picking up bibs. I went upstairs to register, filled out the form, and the woman who took my form asked me “what pace?” Thinking back to what I determined right before I left home, I humbly announced, “uuhh not sure, I think ill be happy with anything sub 7″. She looked at me and then handed me a red bib.

I said “oh, hmmm” and was a little confused. I thought to myself “why red?”. Did they run out of blue bibs? Sub 7 for 18miles should surely be in first corral. If you’re not familiar with NYRR races, the corrals are color coded and your bib color dictates your corral. Blue is first while red is second.

I asked, “can I get into the first corral with this?” realizing the answer before I finished. Watching her shake her head no, her response was obvious.

“Um, I’ve always gotten blue bibs.”

“Not this race… 6:50″

Then I realized the question “what pace” meant “what’s your fastest pace for any race more than 3 miles”. Again, for those not familiar with nyrr, the answer to that question is what seeds your corral. So if you did a 6:50 pace or better for a 4mile race you would qualify for the first corral for this particular race.

Thinking quickly, I said, “my bibs have 6:17 on them.” That happens to be my 4mile pr back in 2007. I haven’t raced anything under 13 miles in nyrr for the past 3 years.

She sighs and then pulls out a blue bib. She proceeds to scold me about something as I watch her cross out the bib# on the wrong application and write my bib# on it. As I was about to point it out she says, “oh great now look at what I’ve done”

We then work together under pressure to figure out what number gets written on each application. She makes the corrections while continuing to scold me on something. Since I’m focused on what she’s doing I only catch the usual key phrases like, “Next time”, and “we don’t usually”, and “on the day of”, etc etc. The whole time I just nod my head smiling and thank her while I stay focused on what she’s doing. I make sure the right bib# is written on my application.

Now I discover tee-shirt pick up is at the start of the race. This complicates things somewhat since I have to first get to wherever shirts are given out, then to baggage, then wait for a port-a-john. The longer I delay getting to a port-a-john, the longer the lines will get.

Port-a-johns at nyrr races are THEE number one stress factor for me before a race. Read any other race report of mine and you will see that.

I run rather fast back to the start thinking of what Jack Daniels recommends as a good warm up for a race. Hard running for 1 to 2 minutes 20 minutes before racing. It’s always worked for me in the past and at this point 20 minutes is about all I got to get everything I need to done.

I get the shirt since I’ll want to change into it after the race when I’m all sweaty. I grab 3 gels from my bag stuff them in my shorts. I swallow about 6 glucose tablets and put the glucose shot in my shorts. I tie my bag to the fence. I run to the port-a-johns and find the shortest line. Things are moving quick enough. This is where I always remind myself its chip time. Its ok to be late to the start, but I’d rather not be.

I get done and head to the start. I have 5 minutes and they’re announcing the corrals are closing. I stay at the back of the first corral. I look at all the red bibs right behind me on the other side of the rope and think to myself how much my blue bib makes a difference. I down the liquid glucose shot and I’m already feeling the effects of the glucose tablets.

The announcements are short, and we’re off.

We head downhill to the start of Harlem hills. I pass by Chris, our female pacer for the 7:30 group at NYRR’s long training run #2. I say hello and have a brief chat about target pace. I move on and wish her luck.

Starting up hill it’s hard to assess how things feel. They’re not too bad, but it’s hard to determine if the effort is right this early on. The hill is a struggle but I am locked in and I continue. I’m passing quite a bit of people. Coming down from Harlem hills, I hit the first mile marker in 6:58. Sub 7 and not much more. If I keep this pace things should be fine since this is the hardest part of the course. I’ll have to do this hill two more times though, since the race is three laps of the park.

Speaking of which, I noticed the mile markers for 1, 7 and 13 were quite a bit a part. The full loop of central park is 6.02 miles. The lane which we are running in is quite wider than usual. I realize the gap is mile markers is due to the fact the lane is twice the width and they measured it assuming all tangents will be cut. I keep this in mind throughout the race. I concentrate on cutting all tangents the whole way.

I do the first 6 miles in 40:20 with the following splits.
1) 6:58
2) 6:47
3) 6:31
4) 6:40
5) 6:42
6) 6:39

I remember thinking things were going too fast. Most of what was going on in my head during this lap was trying to control the pace and adjust it to keep things appropriate for 18 miles. I took a gel between mile 4 and 5. Took water a few times but not every stop. Nothing else significant happened and most things are a blur.

Meanwhile, the second lap was mostly filled with fear and doubts as to whether I was going to be able to hold on for the full race. Before getting past the first half of the second lap, I started lapping the back of the pack. Is was a welcomed since things were feeling somewhat lonely. The splits on the second lap were the following.

7) 6:52 – faster than the 6:58 the first time
8) 6:52
9) 6:41
10) 6:39
11) 6:47
12) 6:38

Heading out for my third lap, mentally, things felt easier. One more lap around. If the second lap can be described as pessimism, this one was mostly optimism. I climbed Harlem Hills and was glad I wouldn’t have to do it again. I passed by the mile 13 marker. I saw the clock was 1:28 and change. I thought to myself, why was the Brooklyn half such a shit show compared to this? 1:29:05 was a struggle then. 1:28 was no problem and I have enough for 5 more. This is a tougher course.

I wasn’t able to get water at any part of the third lap. There were way too many others at this point, all people on their second lap. I zone out until I get to the southern most end of the park. Climbing back up on the first hill heading north, I start focusing on how much more to go. I usually do this towards the end of races and things start feeling tough along with it. I don’t know if one causes the other, and if so, which one. Does the feeling of things getting tough cause me to count the last 2 or 3 miles by every tenth of a mile, or is the fact I’m towards the end of the race and counting the final bits is what’s causing things to get hard.

I make it up cat hill and I feel it. My legs suffer, but I’m almost to the 17th mile marker. From there it’s flat. I’m grateful I don’t have to do cat hill again. I get to mile 17 and I push harder. I pick things up and although its hard, it feels good. I hold it and make my way past the engineering gate and to the minor rolling hills and then towards the transverse. I concentrate on just holding it from there and not pushing more than I am. I don’t want to drop things.

I turn left and start kicking a bit. I hear the announcer mention my name, herb carroll from white plains. I cross the finish line. I check my time and I’m very pleased. But more than that, I’m pleased with how I ran the race. It felt good the whole way through. Mostly, I enjoyed the experience of running it. It wasnt about pushing hard as much as it was about finding comfort and being able to make adjustments to keep things manageable. The last two races, this and the Bronx half have been really good performances for me and the irony is I’ve been caring less about the my times than the experience.

13) 6:55
14) 6:57
15) 6:37
16) 6:41
17) 6:59
18) 6:15 – last lap the fastest :)

My watch said 2:01:19. The official result is 2:01:15. 6:44 pace average. 6:48 was my half marathon pr at the beginning of the year. I did the Manhattan half in January averaging a 6:51 pace. Same course and only 2 laps instead of 3. This has been a good year for me so far. If it all stopped here I would be fine with that.

It turns out this race gives me a VDOT of 53.4. This is my highest VDOT so far. The fact it’s during a long 18 mile race is somewhat reassuring.

After getting my bags and such I go to the finish and watch people cross for about an hour before Tony and Wayne complete. We run into Frank and others as we head to the car and back home.

On the way back, Tony and Wayne wanted to stop off for junk food, and Tony, knowing White Castle is one exception I’ve made in the past to my no junk food rule, declares we are going to the one in Yonkers on the way home. Ironically, this happens to be right near the mile 23 marker of the Yonkers marathon. I decline getting anything to eat because I no longer eat red-meat, but I’m happy to see some marathoners as they finish their race about 3 miles from the finish. I look at this part of the course, as ugly as it is, and question what the hell is it that I like so much about the Yonkers Marathon? Maybe, I’ll get to figure it out next year.