Revenge is Sweet

So as you all know yesterday was the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. I have been waiting for this day for the last 12 months since last year's race. I'm not going to say last year was a failure because I simply started too fast, rather it was doomed to begin with, since I went into the race without much of a gameplan. This year however, was totally different. I started the season buying a Garmin Forerunner 410, which it will sound weird, but literally revolutionized my training regime. To that point I was running with nothing but a stopwatch. I would judge my pace purely by feel, since not only could I not know the current pace but also I would have no clue how far I was into the run. The watch changed my training from going by feel, to becoming systematic and precise. I was able to effectively go on a variety of runs, and complete so many different workouts that I never before could really do accurately and therefore properly. I progressed with my training and looked to sharpen my skills while racing. In high school cross country, and my first few marathons I had no real plan, and not much experience to race competitively. This season I started in the Winterman Half in Ottawa, where I learned how to lead from the front and push the pace myself. I led start to finish dismantling my competition by five and a half minutes. From there, my drive to race only increase and I figured the more I raced the better I would become purely from having different experiences each time I toed the line. I moved quickly on to the 30k in Hamilton, where for the first time I experienced feeding off of another competitor. I ran neck and neck with one competitor for the first 25k of the race and then, building on my previous experience in Ottawa, took control of the pace myself leaving my competitor in the dust up the dreaded hill at 26k. From there I went to London to compete in a smaller half marathon, beat my PB set only 2 months earlier in Ottawa, by learning how to ignore pain, running the race with a bad case of tendonitis. Throughout my training in the lead up to Mississauga I learned many new workouts to gain speed, and it paid off once again smashing my PB set the month before. From there to Barrie, where I once again got to experience the feeling of winning, setting a course record, and learning how to race in any weather with heavy legs. Next, to Dundas where I used pure speed workouts and countless lactate threshold workouts to push my speed limits and challenge a Kenyan for the first time in a race. The feeling a coming so close to winning left me even more determined to improve. On to, St. Catherines where once again I came close to winning, and where I experienced the feeling of running on truly bruised and battered legs. Not only from nagging injuries, but also the sheer volume of mileage.

And then, October 20. The day started at 5:45 with some oatmeal, banana, and a coffee of course. Watched some Ryan Hall videos to get the image of his perfect stride in my head to envision during the race, to keep myself in good form when times got tough. Wasn't able to get much of a warmup in because the setup of the corals was kind of crazy. First having to walk all the way around city hall, and then the fact that there were so many people in the Red Coral (the front corral) that I don't think should've been. I think with a race as big as this one they should really have more corrals with more specific times. For example, to be in the Red Coral you had to be either under 1:45 for the half marathon, and 3:30 for the full. Well I'm sorry but someone running 3:30 is in a totally different ballpark then someone like me aiming for 2:34:00. I am aiming to run 3:40/km compared to 5:00/km. Think about that knowing that at 3:40 you cover 100m in 22 seconds and at 5:00 you are covering the same 100m in 30 seconds - comparatively standing still. Basically, I'm going to be tripping over the guy in front of me. Anyways, so I couldn't get a great warmup in but it was enough to atleast wake up my  left hamstring which is all I am ever really concerned about. The gun went and it was off. About 100m into the race, I had kind of a strange feeling looking around at my surroundings and thinking I can't believe the race which I have thought about for the last year is already here. Well, that's enough philosophizing let's race. Started off in one group of guys for the first 500m but this pace was too slow, but between us and the next group up was pretty far. I made the calculated decision to try and split the gap and make it to that group ahead. This was the lead women's group about 10 kenyans/ethiopian women, and me the Thornhillian. We ran together for the first 4k or so, and then I dropped off because this pace was too random, and I got picked up by a group of 12 other runners. In this group was Lanni Marchant and Krista Duchene the two women who would go on to set Canadian records. Also in the group were a couple of there pacers, and the others were doing the half. Learning from my experience at the 10k in Dundas, I sat just about in the back of this peleton, shielding myself from the west wind. I was loving it, feeling comfortable, despite averaging 3:21-3:25 for the next 10k. Also in the group was Lioudmila Kortchaguina another one of the top Canadian women. Because all the top Canadian Women were in this group the CBC mortorcycle was leading ahead of us the whole time - cool feeling being on tv. At 15k Krista and Lanni put down the hammer, and me and Lioudmila were dropped after slowing to 3:29/km. But we cruised along. I was struggling a bit at about 18k to keep the pace, because lots of thoughts started swarming through my head about starting maybe too quick, but then I saw a couple runners drop off Krista and Lanni's group, and me and Lioudmila picked them up and then dropped them off. Seeing the halfway mark and 1:13:37 got me really excited and I then put down a 3:27 and 3:29 to drop Lioudmila. From that point I was on my own for a while. In fact all the way until 34.5km. At about 25k I started getting some cramping in my left calf, but just ignored it like I've learned how to, and kept on going. On Queen St. I fed off the crowd cheering my name and telling me I could catch Sara Kiptoo a Kenyan woman, who was within site at this point. I knew since I average 3:29 for the first half I could afford to average 3:50 on the second half and still run in for my 2:34:00. And at 30k, with the crowd cheering me on and clocking a couple 3:39s thus extending my buffer a little further, I knew my time would be possible. But I told myself not to start calculating yet, as the race doesn't really start until 32km as many people say. I wanted to really focus on each kilometer and stay in the moment. And at this point the goal was to catch Sara, and the other kenyan/ethiopian runner she was with. I powered through, and on the hill going over the DVP caught the male runner with her, and then passed ahead of her. She pass me on the downhill but I caught back up and we ran together for a kilometer or so until she sped up a bit (we are now at 3:50/km at 37km) and I couldn't stay. I thought that was the last I would see of her, but I caught back up within 20m or so at 39km. The crowd continuing to cheer me on, "You can do it Frank, you can catch her, your almost there, etc," I kept on going. The downhills at this point were starting to really test my quads as they were really starting to feel as though they were about to seize up. So I geared down on these hills, and took them cautiously. At 40k I was neck and neck with Sara, and more importantly at 2:25:21. Even though I easily could have let my mind wander and think just 2.2 more km in 8:39 and we have 2:34, I kept keeping my mantra of one kilometer at a time. I ran that 41km in 3:56 and I now knew I could do it. With the crowd cheering me on, and seeing the sign 800m to go I thought about all my yasso 800s that I did and thought just one more. 500m to go the announcer saying my name crowd cheering, I was so close. I gave everything I had with one last effort (according to my garmin 3:10 pace for about 10 seconds) and crossed the line just ahead of Sara and more importantly 2:34:03. That last effort perfectly represented the last 12 months' mottos of, "One more, keep going, almost there, push harder, power through, hammer it, no pain." Even though I knew I had done enough to prepare for this race, and knew that I could do it, it was still difficult to really see myself crossing the line in the time I set out to achieve so long ago. And now that I did I am feeling a whirlwind of emotions. From I'm so thrilled with my time, to can't wait to see what I am capable of next time around. For instance passing the halfway at 1:13:37 makes me think I can smash my half marathon PB of 1:12:22 next year. O my goodness and I almost forgot about the title of the post: revenge is mine. In addition to getting my revenge on the STWM beating my PB by 18 minutes - ya I said 18, I also beat Fred Karanja by 7 minutes - who as you may remember beat me in the last few meters of the 10k in Dundas, and beat Ryan - who beat me in St. Catharines - by 9 minutes. So that's it for now, I will update the blog in a bit after I decide on plan for november if I decide to do some racing then, and next year. But for now going to take a full week off - not off off - just off running, probably do some weights/swimming/indoor cycling maybe even throw in some upper body weight training just to confuse people in the gym. Also once the picture get posted I will update with pics from STWM.

 Captions:
Top left: This is what I meant be on my own for a while,.

Top Right: Here is the last hard effort to the line (3:10/km for 10sec). Look at that forefoot strike still 2:34 min later.

Bottom left: I put this was I as a joke to look at my absolutely bulging biceps lol. But more importantly looks like I am not coming out and out of my stride which is good. You can see the left leg is still flex as the right leg is pulling through.

Bottom Right: This is at half point I think - just about to say goodbye to Lioudmila.