#426 = ready to race

Late this morning Tim and I drove to Vancouver where we swung by the expo to pick up my race package. My number is 426.

It's now 7:30pm on Saturday evening in Yaletown, Vancouver. Tim, Angelique and I just finished a pasta bolognaise for dinner. With another bidon of Accelerade drink for me.

My four supporters Tim, Angelique and our doggies Luka and Punky are all set, and so am I.

Wishing an awesome race to Leah, Derek, Volker, Jason, Heather, and everyone else running! 

The weather looks perfect

One sleep...

Getting into the marathon frame of mind

As I walked our dog Luka and his cousin Punky (my sister's dog who is staying with us for the week) on this stunningly beautiful spring morning through the Smoke Bluffs, my thoughts were, naturally, on Sunday's Vancouver marathon. It seems like a long time ago since I last ran a 42.195km race, I thought, before realizing that is because it has been more than a year.

Since 2005, I'd adopted the habit of racing two marathons a year. But in 2010, I did the Rotterdam marathon in April - and haven't run one since. Having run a 50-miler in August 2010 and a 100km in November 2010, it hadn't really felt like a long marathon break. 

But as I feel my excitement building these last few days before the Vancouver marathon, I am reminded of how much I love this particular distance. It also makes me realize how much I've missed running one in the past 12 months. It may have felt like a habit I'd gotten into, and needed a break from, and perhaps that is exactly why I am so much looking forward to Sunday's race.

I'm glad to experience the joy of anticipation and am taking good care to hold on to it. You don't want to be overexcited but you do want to enjoy that sense of exhilaration and of looking forward to doing something you love to do. 

This is it, you've trained hard, you know what pace you're going to start at, you've got your clothing, shoes and nutrition ready, have planned to collect or already picked up your race package, and organized your race morning travel plan.

Now it's very important to put yourself into the right frame of mind for race day. One of my training partners from the Squamish Titans Tuesday Runs mentioned he had a horrible Vancouver half marathon last year, and he believes it was mostly due to his mindset. He is in a much better place this year, both physically and mentally, and is excited to have a very different day this time around.

On race day, there will be many things we cannot control but we remain in charge of the most crucial one: our frame of mind. It's up to ourselves to arrive on the start line with a positive mindset, determination to give the best we have on the day, and to keep smiling when things get tough.

If you've never tried flashing a smile in the final third of a marathon, give it a try on Sunday - I guarantee you will get a boost of energy from it. Remind yourself to relax, to stay in the moment and to enjoy. Yes, it will be a challenge but that's the reason we choose to accept it in the first place.

I've often referred to Running Within by Jerry Lynch and Warren Scott, one of my favourite books that proved a turning point for my mental approach to racing, as described in this excerpt from my own book A Hundred Reasons to Run 100km (published March 2011):

27: Because you learn to train your mind

In July 2003, I ran my third marathon at the Gold Coast in Australia. By then I'd been training and racing as a triathlete and completed two Ironmans which finish with a 42.2km run. The fastest I'd covered the marathon distance was as part of an Ironman, in 4:11. I was training more consistently under the guidance of a coach, had more race experience, so physically I'd improved since finishing the Sydney marathon two years earlier in 4:44. In the weeks before my third marathon, I began reading Running Within: A Guide to Mastering the Body-Mind-Spirit Connection for Ultimate Training and Racing by Jerry Lynch and Warren Scott. Reading that book helped me better understand the mental approach to endurance racing. It explains the direct relationship between our mental dialogue and performance, recommending you use positive affirmations. The 2003 Gold Coast marathon was the first race in which I used a cue from Running Within, Relax and Achieve the Max, as a reminder to be calm and release any tension. “Learn to use a cue word during your performance as a stimulus for the relaxed state ... This will reinforce the connection between what your mind is saying to you and what your body is doing. As you say the cue word, feel the stillness spread throughout your body,” Lynch and Scott write. I ran that marathon in 3:24, an improvement of 47 minutes. No doubt my big PB was a result of my improved physical fitness but it was also due to gaining an understanding of how to train and use my mind. As endurance athletes it's important to learn to do that.

End of A Hundred Reasons to Run 100km excerpt.

Before almost every marathon since, I read a few pages of Scott and Lynch's book. On Sunday again, I will use the cue Relax and Achieve the Max at some point in the race.

Another I liked, and used in the Vancouver Sun Run two weeks ago, is the mental image of pushing a treadmill band with your feet - this image, used to remind athletes to use their energy to go forward rather than into the ground by slapping feet hard on the pavement, was mentioned by the inspiring and knowledgeable Kristine Chambers on the TriBC Triathlon Community Coaching clinic I did last month in Whistler. I'll likely use this image again on Sunday.

Last night I was reading in Matt Fitzgerald's Run: the Mind-Body Method of Running by Feel, another book I highly recommend. He writes:

"Through evolution, our species developed an instinctual tendency to run harder when chasing or fleeing something outside ourselves, a tendency that remains with us, because while our environment has changed sigificantly since the birth of mankind, our DNA has changed little. So today we can, if we choose, manipulate this instinct to make a game of running faster by consciously trying to run faster against the clock."

Use your mind, and use it wisely, on race day - it's a crucial tool in the marathon!

Have a great race!

Deciding on your marathon race pace

With four days to go until the Vancouver marathon, you should decide on your race pace if you haven't done so already. It's important for any distance but especially so for the marathon, a race where starting too fast will cost you dearly in the second half.

It's hard to contain your excitement at the beginning of a race that has been your goal for at least four months. That taper has left you rested and that, combined with the energy of your fellow runners, makes it easy to head out too quickly.

This is where race pace planning is very helpful, as it focuses your mind and body on preserving your energy in the first half so that you leave enough in the tank to cover the second half at a similar pace. As tempting as it is to tick off those first kilometres and miles a few seconds ahead of your goal pace, try to avoid it because it usually catches up with you somewhere around 28km or so.

The seconds you save by running the first half a few seconds per kilometre faster are easily lost when you find yourself walking later.

Typically you begin your preparations for a specific marathon with a key goal in mind. If it is your first, finishing is likely your key target. If you've done one before, and have prepared accordingly, you'll likely aim to improve on your previous time.

This will be my 13th certified and standalone marathon (I qualify this as I've run five marathons as part of an Ironman; did what was supposed to be a marathon distance in Death Valley in 1999, though was cut short by 3km because of a sand storm; and have done four ultras, i.e. races that exceed the 42.195km distance - these all provided helpful experience and lessons for running a marathon).

Based on my race times this year - 89:46 for a half in February, between 19:30 and 19:42 for four 5km time trials in the past four months; and a 40:09 10km time two weeks ago - I have decided to aim for a marathon PB which means anything faster than 3:07:10.

I also ran 10 Yasso 800s at the end of March, finishing them between 3:11 (for the second) and 2:54 (for the last). Read more about Yassos and my marathon race pace considerations here.

On Sunday, I will aim to run 4:25 per km or 7:06 per mile (tip: make sure you get your race pace in both km and mile units). A very handy tool is Merv's Running Calculator. I will also aim to do the second half slightly faster than the first.

I ran my PB in the 2008 Victoria marathon (here's a race report including splits). However, I also keep in mind that I've run a 3:12 and 3:10 on the Vancouver course in 2008 and 2009, when I expected to be a little faster (my 2008 Vancouver marathon race report).

Overall, my key goal is to have a great race - by that I mean that I am going to make each step the best it could possible be while reminding myself how much I love running marathons. The result will be, well, exactly that - the result. I am very much looking forward to Sunday.

Have an awesome race!!!

NEW! Sub Nine: History's Fastest Ironwomen

Sub Nine: History's Fastest Ironwomen by Timothy Moore is a book about the 22 women who have finished an Ironman in less than nine hours. Foreword by Ironman.com managing editor Kevin Mackinnon. 

Every generation is defined in part by the achievements of its athletes. Triathlon is one of the youngest and one of the fastest growing sports around the world. In the last four seasons in particular, professional women triathletes have been pacing each other to faster and faster finishing times. This book profiles the fastest iron-distance women professionals-ever. In all, 22 women have finished an iron-distance race in less than 9 hours. Make no mistake, these are the elite of the elites. This book contains snapshots into what drives these athletes. [more]