Report delayed. I’m at Buffalo Wild Wings drinking beer and watching college football. I’m clearly feeling more alive than I did after my last marathon.
I’m on my own sans family if anyone in Indy wants to hang!
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I was in downtown Indy a few weeks ago and the wind was crazy the last day or two
I’ve been doing squats/deads in addition to hiking every weekend and walking during the week. My legs look like a goddamn super hero. Isn’t that extra muscle mass supposed to start burning some of the fat in the disaster area that is my upper body?
A brief summary of the Indy Monumental Marathon experience:
Friday:
- Drove to Indy, did packet pickup and checked into the hotel.
- Went for a 1.5 mile run. Winds were already strong, and they were only half of what was forecast for race day.
- Got some pasta from Buca di Beppo across the street, along with every other person in the universe apparently.
- Watched Without Limits (one of two Steve Prefontaine movies). Probably not a great idea to put Prefontaine’s “start every race at your max and stay there” in my head.
- Slept poorly, which was not surprising to me. I’m always a bad sleeper before big events, so I try to make sure I get decent sleep then night before that, which I did. Alarms set: 5. Alarms needed: 0.
Saturday:
- Out the door at 6am to get some coffee at Panera.
- Did some stretching and general fidgeting. Ate a banana and a bagel while I watched the beginning of Vision Quest.
- Really struggled to decide what to wear. I had brought a bunch of different items (short sleeves, long sleeves, ultralight windbreaker), but ultimately decided that wind would be the biggest issue and the windbreaker would just turn into a parachute. So I just wore a short sleeve shirt. This was almost certainly the right decision.
- Head downstairs at around 7:15. Weather: 59 degrees, light but steady rain, winds 15-23 mph with gusts 35-50 mph. 80% humidity.
Race:
- There’s really not much to say. Here are the 5 mile increments with the average pace for each increment:
- 0-5: 40:17 (average pace 8:03). At the start of the race, I just kept repeating, “Don’t go out too fast”. And I didn’t. Part of this was imposed on me, as the congestion didn’t really dissipate until the end of mile 3. But I did avoid the temptation of weaving around people to try to escape that congestion. Also, my watch GPS bugged out on me during mile 3, which I assume happened because @EmpireMan put a hex on it. Weather-wise, the rain was irritating, but the temperature was fine and wind wasn’t noticeable.
- 6-10: average pace 7:46. To be honest, I don’t really remember anything about these earlier miles. At some point, the rain stopped and the winds still weren’t noticeable. Body felt great, and I was generally aiming to maintain a slightly sub-8:00 pace as long as I could, with the goal of going sub-3:30 for the race.
- 11-15: average pace 7:51. Everything continued to feel good. Inspired by empireman, I was thinking of the race as being a half marathon followed by a 10-miler, followed by a 5k. So it felt good to get the first part of the race over with. Also inspired by empireman, my mantra during this block was just “Don’t do anything dumb before 18 miles.”
- 16-20: average pace 7:56. I succeeded (I think) in not doing anything dumb. I still felt pretty good, and was still thinking that a sub-3:30 was possible. But IIRC, mile 20 was the first time that the winds were REALLY noticeable. Even so, that mile was 8:03, so nothing was really blowing up yet.
- 21-25: average pace 8:49. This is where the winds turned from noticeable to actually being physical opponents trying to block my running like invisible American Gladiators. I think it was when I finished mile 23 when I realized I wasn’t likely going to go sub-3:30. At that point, I was just slightly under a cumulative 8:00/mile pace, but miles 21, 22, and 23 were all over 8:00, and with the wind there was little chance I could get back to 8:00 miles for the last 3. Once I came to that realization, I took a few walking breaks feeling pretty confident that I’d still be able to comfortably beat 3:35. Miles 24 and 25 were by far the worst lap times (9:44 and 9:27).
- Mile 26 was 8:50, and I think the last .2 was in the 7:30-7:40 area, although it’s hard to say because my GPS wasn’t super accurate (It clocked me at 26.59 miles, with most of that excess being fake due to the watch bugging out around mile 3).
Overall pace of 8:09.
Some post-race thoughts:
- Even if I was initially very optimistic thinking I had a chance to BQ, once I saw the weather earlier this week, I knew deep down that there was no longer any real chance. Which I think explains why I’m not really upset about it at all. Also not terribly upset about not going sub-3:30, because it’s a completely arbitrary benchmark.
- I think I had a little bit in the tank at the end. Like, if there was a really important cutoff in play, I think I could have gunned hard and taken off maybe 20-30 seconds.
- Overall, I’m disappointed with the outcome, but given the weather I’m pleased with how I did. I think I ran a pretty consistent race and didn’t make any major mistakes. That being said, I don’t want to overstate the weather’s effects. I think miles 1-19, while not perfect, fell in the normal race day distribution. Miles 20-26, though, were absurd. So many people walking.
- What could I have done in a world with perfect race day weather (like tomorrow seems to be)? I surprisingly don’t care very much. Maybe 3:30? I think empireman is right that a 3:25 BQ time was never really in the cards even with perfect weather. Which is disappointing, but like maybe it’s not terribly important that I BQ? Probably a good discussion to have with a therapist.
- It’s very cool that I did qualify for auto entry to Chicago, which is not something that I knew about. Despite living there for 6 years (and cheering for the race as it ran by my condo), I never ran it. Would be pretty cool to go back there and do it next year or the year after.
- Looking back on my training, my gut instinct is that I put enough time in, but didn’t structure it well enough (i.e., at all). I was opportunistic–I would fit in runs when convenient with our family schedule, rather than having well thought out plans–and probably didn’t do a good enough job working in either quality speed workouts or rest days. Will definitely include Yasso 800s and longer runs at race pace.
- When I came home after my 2016 marathon, I told my wife immediately, “I’m never doing that again.” Today’s race felt different. I enjoyed the run. Didn’t ever feel like I was completely dying (despite the walk breaks I took), and I’m feeling pretty human right now. I probably will run another marathon. Maybe next year, maybe even in the spring. I’m just not sure that I’ll be gunning for an aggressive time. If I do, I’ll definitely take a more structured approach to training.
- I’ve now run marathons in the 90s, the 00s, the 10s, and the 20s. Which is a silly thing, but seems cool to me.
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30 lbs lost in 3 months with Mounjaro. That’s with a three week break from working out with a shoulder injury. Too bad it’ll come back after I’m off it.
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Yes. If it’s really muscle mass. You could just have a very favorable fat distribution that makes your legs look good but with less mass. Alternatively, if you are training lower weights and higher volumes, then you might just be increasing glycogen in your muscles which makes them look bigger, but they’re not actually burning more calories.
At your BW if you are not repping out 3 plate squats and 4 plate deads with ease, then you probably don’t have as much mass as you think. But still having that mass is a lot better than not having it. If it wasn’t there you’d probably blow up with the same diet.
I’ve been on a rugby trip the last 10 days.
A social rugby tournament in Phnom Penh cambodia last weekend, another one yesterday in Saigon /Ho Chi Minh
I was not prepared physically at all. I’m definitely not fit for contact. Nonetheless I really enjoyed it.
I haven’t been playing since Covid. Might have to get back into it, but it’s a big time commitment.
awesome race report, laughed a bunch, totally relate to the alarms thing. And hey Without Limits is a great bad movie, I’ve seen it like eight times
It sounds like you ran a smart race; dude you should feel awesome about that. Running a smart marathon is fucking hard. Eh the 7:45-7:50 pace in those early ten miles would seem a tick fast to me, except you might’ve had a little tailwind there? So yeah, sounds like you ran the thing great. Weather like that is so consequential. On a fair day I’m thinking you could have given 3:25 a shot, w/3:28ish more likely.
Screw planning for a few weeks and prob screw running too. All I’ll say is if you do decide to run a fall marathon then I think you’d race it faster if you did not also run a spring marathon, but instead went to work building a deep mileage base (with a few mini-goals along the way) and planning backwards from a structured 18-week training plan for the fall marathon. If you have a base where you can go into a training plan ready to average semi-regular weekly mileage in the mid50s for a few months, then you can save your therapy money because vegas will be backing you to blow the doors off that BQ time.
the only caveat lector is that Chicago (for example) is October 8th, so a Chicago training plan would be starting early June, leaving only about 20ish weeks (starting from January) to grow the base, which sounds like a lot but it’s not. In part because the 10% mileage rule sucks, it’s cursed bullshit, it’s even shittier than whatever smell apparently overwhelmed a bunch of marathoners today around mile 21 (that according to reddit turned out to be a nearby creek). But whatever—questions for another day. Hope you get tons of sleep next week. Congratulations
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My body isn’t built for squats at all. I can DL 3 plates maybe 1-2 times because I have a long torso and long arms.
But squats are a nightmare. My right foot points out an extra 30 degrees. I wiggle to the side. Every squat is a special snowflake completely unique from the last.
I’m not saying I’m lifting a ton on everything. But I am lifting significantly more than I used to. And my legs for sure are bulging.
Have you tried a Smith machine? It gets a lot of hate, but it’s mostly fine, imo. Will definitely improve consistency.
Yeah in the past. It’s fine. But I feel like I get more out of working all the lateral muscles. I look at it as my squats suck so bad that just gaining 10-20 lbs in lift makes a difference. And I can feel the gains when I slap my upper-hamstring/ass in between workouts. That’s why I think I’m gaining muscle mass.
any suggestions for rapidly building muscle on my surgery leg, due to how I rehabbed i accidentally made my good leg insanely strong and the left one looks shriveled and like 1/3rd the size, no joke.
particularly quads
This Brazilian guy is running a heck of a race in New York if he doesn’t blow up in the back half
Anything squats would be good. Both one and two leg.
I’m loving one leg chair squats at the moment.
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Yeah this seems solid. Maybe start with chair. Then just do pistols unassisted. Move up to pistols while holding weight or wearing a vest.
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I have the same issue, one foot is angled differently than the other which means everything up through the hips has different flexibilities. I try and do squats but they’re way underpowered. I usually have to break them up in to the Romanian deadlifts, front squats, and glut bridges to try and hit the same muscle groups.
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Squats are incredibly mechanically demanding and your leg/ankle width/angle positions can vary based on hip and ankle mobility.
Getting lifting shoes that have a hard sole and raised heel helps with ankle mobility. Regarding width and angle you just kinda have to experiment. Lastly you really want to avoid butt wink since at higher weights it will really wreck your lower back, so you want to take some time to find the correct depth for you to avoid it.
I see maybe one person per week at a commercial gym squatting with what I would consider good form. It’s hard and you need to perfect it at lower weights or it will definitely cause injuries at higher weights (this goes for most compound lifts).
Is that coupon still floating around? If you don’t mind me asking, do you have diabetes or were you just able to be prescribed this for weight loss?
And @CaffeineNeeded how is the medication you said you were trying working? Any chance of getting that prescribed for a non-diabetic?
I’m paying out of pocket for labs for a general check myself to see if I’m deficient in anything and I got a continuous glucose monitor to see if I am having any blood sugar issues. Will then schedule an appointment and follow up with the doctor, so could ask about some of these drugs if they would help me drop the weight faster.
Agree with most of this. I think the best way to work on this is to get a good coach to help you get the form down. But that’s easier said than done. There are a lot of shit coaches personal trainers out there who will give you terrible advice. .
Thought I’d pop into this thread, as I’ve made life-changing progress on my sleep and it seems to have unlocked everything else for me. After literally 14+ years of insomnia and difficulty sleeping, feeling like I’d tried everything, I spent like $1200 on an online course that’s like 10 or 12 weeks long.
Literally three days in, my insomnia was cured completely. Two days in it was markedly improved. The crazy thing that happened was my sugar cravings disappearing completely after those 2-3 days. They were my number one struggle with eating healthy. I also have TONS more energy from getting better sleep and getting more sun exposure.
So I made a weight loss bet (75 pounds in 7 months), and I’m crushing it in the gym so far with my consistency. I’ve done StrongLifts 5x5 12 days in a row, usually but not always working in supersets that are my hypertrophy focused on either chest/arms/shoulders/traps. After I hit 13 straight days tomorrow, a personal record that I set at 29 years old and will be breaking at 36 years old, I’ll start working in normal rest days and mixing up the exercise more.
So far I’ve been walking a convenient 0.8 mile loop around my neighborhood first thing in the morning (add side loop to do a full mile if I have more time), and doing a moderate weightlifting workout of ~45 minutes between 10am and 2pm. Depending on how active I have been, I’ll add a second walk in the afternoon.
Meanwhile I’m eating ~1800 calories a day. So far I’ve dropped 6 pounds in 6 days, I’m hoping to do like 20 in November, 15 in December, 10 each in January and February, then ~6-8 a month from there. More is great, obviously. I have plenty to lose.
The plan is to ramp up some cardio starting sometime in the next week or so, and cut the lifting down to 3-4x a week. I’m also adding to my home gym and curious if anyone’s made any interesting additions that have been really beneficial.
I have a Monster Lite squat stand with the safety bars, an adjustable bench for incline, a barbell, enough plates to get up to 420 pounds, and dumbbells from 5 pounds to 35 pounds. Plan to add 40s, 45s, and 50s soon.
I’d love to add something to enable me to do some of the exercises you’d normally do on pulleys. I’m guessing some sort of resistance bands attached to the stand are my best bet. I’d like to be able to do something similar to cable flies, cable crossovers, and lat pulldowns.
I may also add an EZ-curl bar, although I’d need to find one to work with olympic plates.
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