NYC Triathlon 2014

Race Report

FAT OR CARBS?

A l(not so short) look at the two main options for fueling in endurance sports

My Famous Fails

A little recap of my accidents

Race Recap of the Demi-Marathon des Microbrasseries

Race report for this new race, complete with multiple distances, and BEER!!!

Thursday 27 September 2012

Rock 'n' Roll Montreal Marathon Race Report

Welcome back internet! It's been a while since I've made a post, but now is as good a time as any to get back into it. Since my last post, there has been some news. Firstly, Triathlon season is mostly finished for me for the season, and I have been focusing on my running in order to prepare for the Montreal and New York marathons. Also, I am officially one of the coaches for the upcoming Team in Training Triathlon team! I'll be training new heroes for the Hawaii Lavaman Triathlon in April.

On to the main focus of this post; my race report for the Montreal Rock 'n' Roll Marathon. This was the first year that race fell under the umbrella of the RnR race series, and in my opinion it was for the better. The first and most significant change was that they changed the race course. In addition to making the course easier to block off from traffic, it was also more interesting for participants. There were fewer long stretches of mostly-empty roads to run, not to mention more entertainment along the course. Every few kilometers there was a stage set up with a live band, playing a mix of cover and original rock songs to pump up runners. Since I don't generally listen to music during races anymore, it was nice to mentally sing along to familiar songs as I passed the stage.

Race morning was familiar enough and fairly organized, well as organized as you can be when you have thousands of people converging on one location. In all, there were 2759 marathoners, and another 8700 runners who all met at the Jacques Cartier bridge at 8:30 in the morning to start the run. It was a cold morning, and many people were huddled together against the wind to keep warm for the start. Corrals were staggered, and the starts were released every few minutes to prevent congestion.

My race started quite strong. I kept a solid starting pace, and I mostly followed up on any TNT participants I could fine, running alongside them for a few seconds to see how they were doing. For about an hour I actually ended up running with a friendly Montreal participant. His pace was slightly faster than mine, so rather than push myself too hard, I let him go ahead of me. My 21k split time was 54:30.

The next 10k went pretty much the same, but after that it got harder. A lot harder. It wasn't just an issue of cramping, or running out of gas, but it just got hard. By the time I hit 32k, I knew I had exactly an hour to run the last 10k if I wanted to break 4 hours. Unfortunately I knew that wasn't going to happen. I pushed, and walked a whole lot. I've seen videos and pictures of people crying when they cross the finish lines of races, and for the first time I really understood why. I crossed the finish line after a 4:07 run, and headed straight for the medical tent for a much needed massage.

That's all for now. Stay posted for training updates as I get ready for the New York ING Marathon.

Thanks for reading, and keep Tri-ing!