Okay, where to begin? What a day - I think I'll break it into a few different parts - the race from a running perspective, the race from an experience/cultural perspective, and post-race dealings and thoughts.

So first of all, the race. If I had been asked to take my finishing time beforehand, I would have. My original goal was to complete in under 4:30, which would correspond to about a 3:30 normal marathon - and my finishing time was 4:10, so I'm pretty satisfied.

The Kilimanjaro Marathon course is tough, and even starting at 6:30am it was *very* warm after only 10 minutes. And while the organizers describe the first half as "flat" with rolling hills, I actually found the rolling hills to be quite frequent and moderately long and steep at some points. About halfway through you start the long 10k climb uphill, and then finish with the 10k back down.

For the first 75% of the race, I was actually doing much better than I had anticipated; I had planned all my breaks, food/drinks, and pacing really well. I had a bag of powdered Gatorade that I used to refill at the water stops, ate bits of my Clif Bar, and felt very comfortable.

I Passed the half at 1:43 feeling very easy and relaxed, then did a lot of walk/jog uphill as planned for the 10K uphill portion. Then I made the rookie mistake - I started clock-watching and adjusted my goals. I was well on pace for a sub 4:00 when I started downhill, and that got me so excited and pumped up, I was feeling strong, so I decided not to do my planned 2-minute rest/stretch at the turnaround. About 200m into the downhill, both calf muscles cramped and I went down hard. A fellow runner saw me and called the emergency vehicle. At that point I was so bummed since there was no way I could continue another 10K.

Fortunately, after about 3-4 minutes, I was finally able to work a leg around and grab my laces to stretch, then the other leg, then staggered to my feet. The remainder of the downhill was a combination run, pull up in pain, walk, run, etc. And I used the Ibuprofen I had put in my running pack. But I did finish strong the last kilometer, navigating the dusty roads and traffic at the end. In the end, the downhill ended up taking almost the same amount of time as the uphill.

So overall, I'm pleased with my fitness level and my effort - but just disappointed (ego talking here) that my time didn't reflect either. As my first marathon, and the Kilimanjaro Marathon to boot, I would have loved to have broken that psychological barrier of 4:00, which would translate approximately to a 3:15 flat marathon.

But I did have a great time overall (separate post to follow), and learned a lot about the marathon - don't adjust your goals too much during the race, and check your ego at the starting line. Oh, and 42.2 km is a long way to run!

03/05/07 by bryan
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