The Marathon Breakdown

I wake up at 4:45 A.M. I slept like a log. I go and make coffee and oatmeal, then try to go to the bathroom. No luck. I take a shower and am feeling pretty rested. I am not that focused on the race and am feeling pretty calm as well.

We leave the house around 6:20 A.M. I sit in the back seat with Afrojack’s Essential Mix playing. We enter the Metrodome, that disgusting hell hold. Ironically, there is a longer line for the men’s bathroom than the womens. At first I was confused, then I got it, the men have one stall, the women have three. HA. Hilarious. I pulled down my warmups and put on Vaseline all over legs, waistband and armpits. At this point, I changed my music to my “Running Pump Up Music” and targeted Blink-182’s “Anthem Pt. 2” to be my final song before heading out to the starting line. I do a lap around the metrodome, do some light stretching, but there really isn’t much warming up you can do for a marathon since the first few miles are supposed to be very very easy if you are not competing to win. Non the less, I was feeling ready. I was starting in Corral 2 and was not allowed to move into corral 1. I was upset but glad because I had a clear view of the path without people getting in my way. (I was essentially in the second wave of runners).

I took off my long underwear and left behind that and my nalgene, one of the 20 we have at home (Parent’s didn’t care that much when they found out thank god).

So the gun goes off and I get passed by about 50 people on the spot. They are booking it, I laugh and tell myself that I will absolutely pass them along the way, just wait till the half. The first mile I was bored, relaxed and feeling pretty good. I caught up to the tail end of the first group pretty quickly. Matt’s mom, whose known me for the better part of my running career, had told me to make sure I don’t get stuck in the middle, to be on the side so I can just tell people on your left and they will move out of the way. I took her advice and was passing the people that would be running much slower than my intended pace without a problem. We made our way out towards Hennepin and I was feeling good. Mile 2 is where Karen Feder said she would be and I started looking around for her, forgetting that my moustache made me almost impossible to recognize. I make my way up the first hill with ease and then take a hard right towards Lake of the Isles. The first water station is there and I quickly learn that I am going to have to bend these paper cups to an angle to ensure that they actually get in my mouth and not all over my jersey. The Powerade and water are extremely important to be drinking during those first few miles since they ensure that you will be hydrated later on. The first one spills all over me, and the second one is no better. I take a water about 100 meters later and realize I need to go to the bathroom. No point in thinking about that, I’m not stopping. We go downhill where a significant number of people pass me. Tempted as I am, I stick to the plan. No worrying about pace until 7.

Lake of the Isles is packed. So much so that I run on the grass for a bit just so I don’t have to be pushing my way up and elbowing other runners. This happens for about 3 minutes and then I pass the 3:30 group around mile 4. Things start to clear up a bit after that. We make our way towards Lake Calhoun and I finally feel like I have a bit of space to let my legs really open up. I avoid the temptation, but take my first gel pack. I am calm around Calhoun and hit 5 and 6 right on pace. Then there is that hill that every person who runs in Minnesota knows about. The hill between Lake Calhoun and Lake Harriet. From the start point to now, there has been literally no places without people. This hill is the first time I actually hear silence from the crowd. We head towards Harriet, then make our way by the bandshell and then to unknown territory. At about 6.5 I am with a group and we chat for a little bit. There is a gap of about 10 meters between us and them. It was the first amount of tangible distance I had seen between runners. I start to get excited and my legs are starting to feel good. I pick up the pace.

I pass 7 without even knowing it and hit a group of extremely athletic looking women and a few older, less in shape men. Some of them are panting, some of them aren’t. I’m feeling fine. I remind myself that I need to play this race conservatively so I have energy in the true "race" of the marathon. I tell the crowd to make noise and right at the corner of mile 8, I see Dan and Hillary Feder. They looked psyched and I point right at them. A woman on the street offers me a goo (an extremely intense caffine and electrolyte gel) and I am well on my way to picking up the pace yet again. I tell myself to stay calm until at least 10, but really don’t care that much. I’m feeling fresh and know that I could manage a pace like this for another 16.2 miles, I think. Miles 9 through the half are pretty much a blur. My goal was to catch the 3:20 group by the half then work my way down from there. I catch them right at the nick of time. The halfway point is right there and there is a huge crowd of runners. I am right in the midst of them when I cross the halfway point. I look at my watch 97! Perfect. Right where I needed to be. I pick up my pace again and start picking off people left and right. It’s not really until mile 15 that I really started putting myself into a tempo run mentality and it was about here where my miles were down to 6:55s to 7:10s.

I was cruising. Miles 15-19 were the best of my marathon. I picked off more people there than I could have ever imagined. Strong, built men and elite women were falling like dominos. I remember seeing a few men in front of me who had just looked jacked. I had caught up to these guys. Damn son! I thought in a bit more vulgar way. We hit the Minehaha parkway and mile 19 was right there. That meant that we were done with Minneapolis. St.Paul was on the horizon and the finish was way closer than the start. I had been on the road now for about 2:14 and had a very very strong 19 miles. My coach  told me that it doesn’t feel like a race until after 18. I was beginning to understand. I went over the bridge and put myself on the farther end so I could pass without pushing. Twas easy.

I was at 20. We were in no man’s land. The crowd was thin. I started to ride with a few other guys for a longish, not incredibly steep hill. Some woman around 21 yelled to us “Only 5.2 miles left” “SHUT UP” this guy and I both said both thinking the exact same thing. I don’t care about how far the damn finish is. I care about getting through mile 21, then working my way through 22, 23,24, 25. We make a left and I see that I’m on Summit Ave. Wow. Relax Elliot. You're not done yet. Keep focused and just stay calm. If you run 7:30s you qualify for Boston!!!” Summit starts with a hill, then houses. Oh those houses. I remember how many times I’ve driven down it, but man oh man is it different now. The crowd is enormous. So much cheering. I am no longer Elliot Upin, but 3187. There weren’t that many people by me at this point, probably people staggered out every 100 meters or so. When you have that much room between people, the crowd is literally cheering just for you. Everyone is going “Smooth stride buddy” “Keep it up” “Lovin’ the stache”.

At mile 22 I finally see my Uncle David out of the corner of my eye and point at him. That was the last time I was going to care about the crowd. Now I run. I felt okay during mile 22 but it had been 5 miles since my last GU and realized that I desperately needed something with caffeine. I hit the wall. By 23 the bad thoughts that I refused had forced their way into my head. I knew exactly where I was. I had grown up in Minneapolis. I knew that Summit had to be almost done with and when I finish Summit, I finish the marathon, kind of. Miles 22-25 were the longest miles of my life. I started looking at my watch more over, and was rejecting water. During other water stops on the later miles, I would feel myself get out of breath whenever I took water. I was toasted. I was going to a dead halt at around 25 and then I saw the Cathedral.

The spot where I knew I was going to finish. I had time to BQ. If a 350 meter run was completed in 2 minutes, I qualified. My brain shot adrenaline to my entire body and I felt like I was finally moving again. I was out of breath, tired and only thought of finishing strong. I looked at my watch with 100 meters left. I was at 3:10:20. I was safe. MISSION COMPLETE…almost! I sprinted to the end and stopped my watch. 3:10:46. I qualified by 13 seconds HAHAHA AWESOME!

I walked to a few people and very faintly said. “I’m going to collapse” They put me in a wheel chair and I was extremely disoriented. The only thing I could only utter the sentence “I BQ’d”. In the medical tent, I was given ice for my left shoulder, which was in the most pain. They put me on a patio chair upside down so the blood could rush back to the rest of my body and out of legs. I tried to stand up but needed help getting on my feet. After a few troubling moments, I finally made it up and started to walk. I was going to be fine. I walked around, drank some Powerade and two chocolate milks. Usually after my long runs, I’m starving, but my stomach wasn’t feeling great. I had eaten about 6 of those Power Gels and getting solid food down wouldn’t start for another hour or two when I devoured a Margherita pizza.

Overall, I wish I hadn’t picked up the pace so much from 15-18 and had an extra gel pack that I would have taken around mile 22. This probably could have saved me some pain down the stretch and having more even splits would have allowed me to break the 3:10:00 barrier. It was a success beyond anything I could have anticipated. I did awesome and felt great. I cannot wait for the next one!

Some fun statistics:
I finished in my age group 6 / 106 (94th Percentile)
I finished overall 405 / 8535 (95th Percentile)
I finished in my sex division 347 / 4857 (93rd Percentile)