My Marathon Debut at Oakland, 2014

I ran my first marathon at Oakland,CA on March 23rd, 2014.
I did reasonably well for a first timer to finish at 3 hrs, 42 mins, 4 seconds at 8:28 min/mi average marathon pace.
Some of my friends have been surprised by my sub 4 hr marathon debut considering I started running only 11 months back.

How and why did I start running?

On April 29th, 2013, I took my car to go to the barber shop. Just about half a mile into the drive, I suddenly decided to park my car and run the remaining mile or so to the barber shop.
I had no intention to start running but the decision to run was impulsive.
I couldn't run the full distance and was huffing and puffing trying to run 1 mile.
On the way back, I did slightly better but I still felt terrible.
But I didn't stop running after that. I wasn't impressed with my fitness.
So I decided to run again the next day. And again, and again logging a decent 1,750 miles in about 10-11 months before running my first marathon. I was liking the feeling that stayed with me after the runs. I was changing as a person both mentally and physically.
I could see that myself and of course, the food had never tasted better. So there was no reason to actually stop.

Why did I register for a full marathon even before registering for a half marathon race?

Before I even ran my first marathon, I registered for 3 marathons. The colleague who had asked me to register for Oakland half marathon in Oct, 2013 was surprised to see me register for a full marathon even without running a single half marathon race.
He had run over 80 marathons and called me crazy and ambitious to register for a full marathon race without even a half marathon race experience. Racing is different than solo training runs.
He was right. I was probably ambitious but I had no goals in mind. The marathon distance didn't really instill fear. And I signed up without even giving it a thought.
I signed up because I was running 45 mile weeks while registering for the marathon last year.
I had already run about two 15 milers and a couple of 14 milers. And I thought, a marathon was doable because I had 5 more months to train.

Training

I did not deviate much from my running routine for marathon except adding a couple of 20+ mile long runs.
I was running about 50 miles a week on average with only 1 maximum weekly mileage of close to 60.  My peak mileage were all during the winter and it was hard doing those long runs at -5C average temperature.
I did not follow any marathon training plan. I followed my own.
On weekdays, I didn't change my routine. I stuck to the 5.1 mile weekday average like I was doing since end of July, 2013.
On weekends, I was doing 7.8 miles and 15.4 miles.
I try and stick to this routine even now.
I rarely altered it. Like sometimes, changing the 7.8 to 11 miles.
I also did only two 20 mile runs in December, last year. I also added only about two 17.5 milers in between.
In January, I started taking a day off from running on Monday. So my mileage was around 45-47 miles for 6 days a week.
And about 1 month before the marathon in mid Feb, 2014, I did my longest run of 22 miles.
So, my average longest run was between 15 and 16 miles and I did a lot of them regularly every weekend without fail. Probably about 20, 15-16 milers before my first marathon.

2 weeks before the race

About 2 weeks before race day, I took part in a 10 mile trail race in a rocky and hilly terrain with some colleagues. It was a good experience going into the Oakland marathon.
On the last week of the marathon, I did like 2 half marathons.
A 15.6 miler on the Sunday before the marathon followed by a 13.4 miler on Wednesday.
But I also rested for 3 days that week which was important going into the race day.

The race

Oakland marathon course is a challenging course. At least for a first timer, you prefer flat and fast courses to make your debut.

But Oakland was tricky and made planning your marathon splits that much hard. 

So before the marathon started, my marathon target was 4 hrs.
When I went to collect my bib with my colleague, it changed to 3 hrs, 50 mins after meeting a pacer.
And when the race started, I followed the 3 hr, 40 mins pacer.
Pretty ambitious but I felt comfortable at that pace and hence managed to run with the pacer almost through the entire course.
Running with a pacer removes planning for your splits from the equation in case you are able to stick with him. The pacer is a machine that is destined to reach the target on time. He does not stop. So if you manage to run with him, you don't have to monitor your GPS and manage your splits. You are guaranteed to reach the destination on time. Planning becomes relatively easy as you have to just follow him to be on time.
In a course like Oakland, and for a marathon debut, its better to follow the pacer and avoid planning your splits.

Click here for my garmin activity tracker for Oakland with elevation and pace profiles

As can be seen from the activity tracker above, the first half of the Oakland course is mostly hilly and tapers down towards mile 12 with a 1 mile downhill that can easily break your second half of the marathon.
The second half of the course beginning from mile ~13-14 is flat. So if you are aiming for negative splits, you want to attack the hills conservatively before going fast on the second half of the course.
That's easier said than done when your second half starts off a pretty steep 1 mile downhill.
Any runner would know that downhills are the trickiest to run. The shock that your quads take during the downhill can easily result in fatigue when trying to attack the flat course.
The entire race can fall flat in the second half. Luckily for me, I was feeling good coming off the downhills.
I was regularly hydrating myself every 3-4 miles and I had mastered the art of drinking on the run while following the pacer. Its important that you learn the art of fueling on the run since that would knock off vital minutes from your goal time.
You should practice drinking fluids and taking Gu gels on the run instead of trying that on race day.
My first and only Gu gel shot came pretty late at mile 13 just after the downhill.
Around mile 18, I chewed some jelly beans.
I was feeling good till about mile 24 and maybe into mile 24.5 when my pace suddenly dropped and I couldn't follow the pacer.
I did not stop but I was very low on glycogen. I wouldn't say, I hit the wall since I was still running but my pace dropped from 8:20 to like 9 and then into 9:40's while into mile 25 and into the finishing line.
My colleague who was running his 83rd marathon and qualified for Boston with a 3hr 15 mins finish tapered off around mile 22 and I caught him around mile 24.
We finished at around the same time at 3 hr, 42 mins and he later mentioned that he ran out of gas on mile 22 while going with the 3 hr 30 mins pacer.

Post race thoughts

I still feel unhappy about dropping 2 minutes in that last mile considering I was on target for a 3:40 finish.
I still feel, had I taken a gel or fueled around mile 22 when I was feeling good, I might not have dropped those 2 mins.
But I guess, I was lucky considering I only lost like 2 minutes in those last 2 miles.
Marathons are hard. The last few miles are always tricky.

If you are feeling good at mile 20, there is no guarantee that mile 21 would be the same and so on and so forth till the finish line. Be prepared to endure the last few miles. That would be the real test of your training.

The actual marathon starts only from mile 20 to 26 and that's where you should be prepared for the worst to suddenly hit you with all its force. 

Many people lose several minutes in the last 10k of the marathon.

That's the real second half of the marathon. 

Mile 25/26 was probably the hardest I have ever run and when I finished the race about 2 mins late than my target time of 3 hrs, 40 mins, I was close to hitting the wall. I had little energy to even receive the coveted finisher's medal. All I needed was food.
It took me about 1 to 2 hrs to recover before I was on a marathon finisher's high for like 2 days.

I took 2 days off from running after the Marathon day before continuing with my runs again.

Onward

I am running a couple of half marathon races in the upcoming weeks. Some are nice scenic runs that I would be running with a friend.

There is still lot of scope for improvement and I have the SFO marathon coming up on July 27th, 2014 with the same colleague.
If I get selected in lottery for Chicago marathon, I would be running that as well.
I am also signed up for next year's Napa Valley Marathon on March 1st, 2015.

Looking forward to the challenges ahead ...