Melbourne Marathon 7th October 2007
Time : 3:30:52 (Official Net Time)
Avg HR: 159 Max Hr : 177
Out : 1:45:47 Back: 1:45:05
The thought of finishing a marathon inside of the MCG grabbed my imagination after the Gold Coast this year. After allowing for a proper recovery from the Coast race, there was never going to be enough time to have a proper preparation so from the out set my only aim was not for a good time but to enjoy myself, soak up the atmosphere and take in that final lap.
The flu in August didn't make for an ideal preparation. That was a week of absolutely no running and looking back I feel it took me another three weeks to fully get over it completely. Over that period, I often thought of keeping two logs. One of how many Ks my legs were doing and one to track my runny nose. So in the end, I found myself at the starting line having done only four 31.5K run in the 14 weeks since Gold Coast. As well I had been having some niggles in my left calf over the last month that were playing on my mind.
So the plan was to start out at 5min Ks and just see how I went. I was expecting that in the last 10k the inevitable fade would occur as I tired but I was happy to go with that as long as I got to the finish line.
The Friday night before going down, I went to the Roar game and witnessed a rare home win. Yeah!! I normally come home and watch a recording of the game and seeing we had one I couldn't resist, so it turned out to be a late night.
The flight out the next morning was a scheduled for 8:15 am, so it was up early as well. It certainly was a strange feeling, My Wife and I shutting the door behind us and leaving our sixteen year old eldest in charge of the other three children for the weekend. We have never done this before but now was the time.
We were staying in East Melbourne about 1 K from the start, so on arrival made our way to the start area to suss things out. Bumped into Tesso , Mat , The Toasties, et al and had a rather large pasta lunch at the MCG which certainly filled me up so that I only needed a light dinner. My Wife and I walked into town and visited a Gallery in Federation Square and went into the Pixar exhibition where to our surprise was a model of Mike from Monster's Inc.
Our three daughter's are all big into dancing and the highlight of the year for them is the end of year concert. This year Dory has been chosen to be Mike in one of her dances. Mmm. I may be one-eyed but I can see why they picked her. (Luckily she doesn't read this blog).
After that it was a light dinner and I was asleep by 9:00pm.
On Sunday morning, I arrived at the start with 15 minutes to start time. It was hard to know where to slot into the accumulated mass of 8,000 starters for the Half and Full. I made my choice and ended next to Karen. We then waited. The start was delayed by 20 minutes and the longer I waited and looked around at my fellow competitors, the more I realised I should have been a little closer to the front. The gun eventually went and it took well over three minutes to get to the start line but we were really only walking even then. The first 500 metres is all down hill but even that didn't get things moving. The first K was 5:27. At the left turn into St Kilda Rd things again slowed to a walk but the congestion eased a little after this. The 2nd K was much quicker at 5:17!
All up St Kilda Road, it was a matter of ducking and weaving around people and even though by the third K, I had managed to get to 5 minute Ks, it was hard work mentally. The first drink station was an absolute bun fight which I chose not to participate in. If you can imagine 15 people abreast in columns all moving over to the take drinks at the first table you can get an idea of what was happening. The poor volunteers were completely swamped and could not get the sachets out of the boxes fast enough to satisfy the throngs. It was not much better at the next drink station either.
It was with great relief that at the 13k mark the Half Marathoners peeled off to the left to head back and things started to settle down. It always nice to get into a rhythm or a zone early in a marathon but that had not been possible up to that point. I think it showed in my Heart Rate. On such a flat course, I would have expected to be able to churn out just sub 5m/ks at around 140- 145 but I managed to oscillate between 140 and 159 over the first 13k.
Maybe some of that variation could have been explained by the wonderfully upbeat soukous from the Congolese album
Sangonini by
Les Quatres Etioles (The Four Stars) that I listened to for the first seventy minutes.
The course was now following by the bay and I don't know if it was just the sight of all that water but I really felt like I needed a toilet stop, so ducked behind a shrub to gain some relief which made for a 5:22 K 15th K.
I really got into a nice groove along here. The half way point came and 1:45:47 saw me just over the 5m/K average. At this point , the runners coming back from the turn around were coming by. It is always a good point in a race and helps occupy the mind. Lots of "Go Coolrunner" from me as people passed. I saw Eagle, I Like Toast, Mat and Tesso and many other Coolrunners who I didn't know. Then at the turn around I was seeing all the people still on their out bound journey.
I was now listening to my compilations of my favourite music from 2006. Every track a favourite, what away to go. It always impresses on me what a great racing song Bruce Springsteen's "Keep you Eyes on the Prize" is. I passed my sister somewhere along this stretch.
I spotted Tesso ahead of me in the distance and was slowly catching up to her and eventually passed her and another CR at around 31K (I think). I was still managing to churn out the 5 minute ks and feeling very comfortable. The weather was quite strange. Parts of the course here had a bit of a head wind and it was quite cooling but if the breeze stopped it was quite warm with the cloudless sky.
At 32k , I was still feeling good . Down St Kilda Rd, I latched on to another runner who was doing the same pace as me and we stayed together right up to the bridge before the MCG.
With about 2k to go, I estimated that if I kept up the current pace I could possibly go sub 3:30 but having walked over that bridge the day before I knew it would take a super effort to keep the pace up going up that rise. I would leave the heroics to another day, so I cruised up the bridge , soaked up the tunnel of spectators around the members entrance of MCG, and then slowly built up the speed again on the long loop around the MCG concourse until I finally entered the entrance under the stand and burst forth into the greatest sporting arena in Australia the MCG.
As I completed that last last lap on the grass, I imagined the stands were full and I was finishing to their standing ovation. What a brilliant experience and one I will always treasure. Managed to get the Heart Rate up to 177 over that last couple of hundred metres so it seems I still had a bit in the tank. In the end I managed to negative split the second half by some 42 seconds. WHAT A FANTASTIC DAY.
After getting out of the recovery area, went inside and caught up with My Wife. I wanted to wait around and see my sister finish but it was so cold inside the MCG and I was starting to shake so we went outside and waited in the sun to see her go by. After that we went back to the apartment and had a shower and then caught up with everyone at the Transport Hotel. An equally great end to a fine day.
I would recommend to everyone to do this race. I hope the organisers iron out a few of the bugs regarding the start and the water stations. It would be an ideal course to go for a good time but for just the experience it will be hard to beat. If the current course configuration stays this event will be huge.
My other lasting impression I will take from the race will be the incredible 13 Spartans that were doing their 3oth straight Melbourne marathon. I passed about four of these on the course. You could tell them by their T shirts which had "I have done the Lot" on the back. It certainly was inspring to be running amongst such elite company.
