Surf City USA Marathon - February 7th (Finish: 04:44:29)
Surf City USA Marathon, the first of the five marathons that I'll be running in 2011, has probably got to be my least favorite of all the marathons I've run so far. The latter half of the course had me going back and forth for 16 freaking miles!!! Yes, the view of the gentle crashing waves of the ocean was right there, but when I'm zig-zagging for that far of a distance, I couldn't care less if there were hundreds of speedo-wearing men waiting to fan and feed me grapes! One of my worst pet-peeves are out and backs and this had runners zig-zagging 6 times! I guess the one positive thing I found about this was that I got to see Joe at least once during the race. Overall, the weather was over cast and the organization of the race was mediocre. My goal initially was to beat my NYC marathon time of 04:30, but from the beginning of the race, I could feel my legs were heavy and never properly warmed up. I changed my goal to finishing under 4:45 and was happy that I barely achieved that.
The Surf City USA marathon was Joe's first marathon, which he did extremely well (not that that would surprise me in the least bit, of course!). It was also supposed to be the first of 3 marathons that would make up the California Dreamin' Series in which upon completion, you would receive a jacket and a medal. I found out not too long ago that this series actually ended this year with the Surf City USA marathon, AFTER I had already registered for the SF and LB marathon. The race series had been replaced by the Beach Cities Challenge, a similar series except the SF marathon had been replaced by the OC marathon. You get a nice medal for completing the series, but not a jacket as you would have in the Cal Dreamin' Series. In addition, you have to complete these 3 events CONSECUTIVELY, whereas the Cal Dreamin' series allowed you 2 years. It was extremely frustrating to learn that they ended the series and it was not even mentioned on their site of a end date.
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| Surf City Marathon Route - Curse you, zig-zags! |
La Jolla Half Marathon - April 17th (Finish: 1:59:40)
After my disappointment with the Surf City USA marathon, I decided to up my running from 4 times to 5 times a week and including a day of speed/interval/tempo training to try and regain my speed to last year. I had noticed that since November, my pace had been gradually getting slower and I attribute it to slacking on my running and weight gain (diet and stress). So, since February, I had been watching my diet and trying to increase my running and visits to the gym to 5x and 3x respectively.
The week of the La Jolla half, I ran a total of 38 miles (17mi on Mon, 5 on Tues, 8 on Wed, 5 on Thurs, 3 on Sat). So needless to say, my legs were very tired. I was determined to keep up with my running schedule. It was strange, though, because in that week of running, even though my legs were tired, I was able to keep up a pretty decent pace for each run ( they ranged from 9min/mi to 9:20 min /mi). However, the 3 mi on Saturday proved to be an exhausting run. I'm glad that I shortened it to 3 and did not run the 5 I had planned. It was enough to push out the lactic acid and warm my legs up for the LJ half.
Compared to last year, my over all pace was slower by about 30 seconds (8:33min/mi 2010, 9:02min/mi 2011). The weather couldn't have been more perfect. It was overcast and a very gentle breeze. Of course, it was way too cold for me in the morning, but I knew that it would warm up quickly once I started running. Once I began running, I was very excited to feel that my legs didn't feel like it did on Saturday. It felt good and ready to run 13.1 miles! What I love about the LJ half is it doesn't feel like 13.1 miles. I'm familiar with the route as I ran it a few times last year before the 2010 race. Once over the N. Torrey Pines Hill, you are more than half way through the race! I throughly enjoyed the race as I did last year, even if I did not run it as fast as 2010. I was proud that I was able to keep a great pace for over 13 miles! This has further encouraged me to keep up with my speed training and stick with my gym routine to get back to where I was last year. In 2 weeks, the OC marathon!
2011 La Jolla Half Marathon Garmin stats
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