Race Recap State #7: Virginia

Race: Marine Corps Marathon
Date: October 25, 2015
Result: 5:36:19

Wow, what an incredible, inspiring race.

I was offered a bib transfer back in April from a friend of Greg, an old supervisor who initially inspired me to start running and after checking if it could count for a state, I jumped at the chance.  The race starts and ends in Virginia although much of it runs through Washington, D.C.  They recently had to move to a lottery system because of heavy demand and it is now one of the tougher races to get into.

With a dwindling number of vacation days set aside, I decided to make this a solo weekend trip with Mae's hectic work schedule impossible to tell if she'd be able to come and support/race with me.  So it would be my first race without my beloved support crew.  But at Ragnar Chicago last June I found out fellow Napa Ragnar teammate April was also registered to run, and happened to book the same flights since it was so cheap.  So at least I would be going with good company.

These folks are all in line to buy stuff

We arrived at BWI Saturday morning and took a public bus and train straight to the expo, which took longer than our flight.  There were marines everywhere.  Handing out bibs, providing directions, everything.  Brooks sponsored all the official merchandise and I got a visor and waited in line for 40 minutes to buy it.  The line to check out was crazy.  April was a little ahead of me and as she made the final turn at the end of the line I cheered her on that she was almost there and to finish strong.

We left the convention and met up with the very long legged Elizabeth, a friend and former co-worker of April who moved to the DC area a few months ago. She made plans to grab lunch at Union Market, a short walk for her, but a much longer walk for us!  The combination of us starving and complaining about not knowing how much further we had to walk kind of annoyed Elizabeth.  "I thought you guys were marathoners and were used to this!"  It was worth the hike though, because it was a very cool building with lots of options.  April shared a cheese-stuffed empanada with me and I got a tray of delicious bulgogi tacos and a pint of Atlas District Common beer from TaKorean.  I got the chance to do some video chat with Mae and the kids while April and Elizabeth did some more catching up.

Getting my carb on

Riding the Metro

After checking out Elizabeth's beautiful high rise digs in NoMa, a quick ride on the Metro brought us to our hotel, The Capitol Skyline Hotel, a no frills older place near the ballpark.  I loved their subway.  Although I had never ridden DC's subway system, I had an overwhelming feeling of deja vu, when I realized it was because I spent extensive hours down here while playing Fallout 3 on the Xbox.  We had an hour to decompress at the hotel before heading back out to carbo load at Sette Osteria, where we met up with another of April's running friends Phoenix and her husband, who were also from Chicago in town to run. Phoenix, a petite Vietnamese woman in her 50's just started running marathons a few years ago and can post near Boston qualifying times.  She's so inspiring.  We talked running most of the dinner while I filled up on Gnocchi Alla Sorrentina and a Moretti which really hit the spot.  It was almost 10 pm by the time we made it back to try to get some sleep before the big day.

Waiting to get through security

I kept waking up every hour and started the race in a pair of broken tsinelas and couldn't run.  Woke up relieved that it was just a bad dream and I had actual running shoes for the race at around 4:30.  We checked out, grabbed some McDonalds and I ordered a muffin and coffee, which I guess is a midwest regional thing since my order was returned with a puzzled look and was given an egg mcmuffin without the egg, cheese or bacon.  Oh well, better than nothing.  Our Uber dropped us off right on the highway since the police had blocked off the exit ramp and we hoofed it down to the security line at The Pentagon around 6:15, still under darkness and a light rain.  And waited.  And waited. Turned out 30,000 runners had to get through four lines of security, and we didn't get through until after 7:45.  We high-tailed it over to gear check where we had pre-assigned UPS trucks. Amazingly we had the same truck assignment. My gear check bag was so full it had ripped. We were still over a mile from the start line, and as we were running to the get there, the ground began to shake and a thunderous pair of Bell Boeing V-22 Ospreys had taken off behind us and flew right over our heads.  It gave me the feels.

The gun started before we caught up with the 11 minute pace runners and we finally crossed the start line about 25 minutes later.

Because the course laps over itself, we hit the mile 26 marker about a half mile in.  I said out loud that this was so much easier than I thought it would be, which brought a few chuckles from the runners around me.  But I did take it easier than I've ever done before, since I knew the first eight or so miles of the race are the hilliest.  At my current weight of 195, I run comfortably at around 10:30 pace, a minute slower than my fittest version of me, which was when I ran my second marathon in 2013.  So I ran an 11:30 pace and held back immensely, hoping to delay my eventual bonk.  The course initially ran through Rosslyn, and my decision to run without ear buds helped me take in the race more.  There was a split in the road on the first mile where the left side had to climb an overpass and back down while the right half of the runners stayed level.  I got lucky and stayed right.  We quickly left the urban landscape of Rosslyn and took on some scenic, hilly terrain through miles 2-4 before crossing over the Potomac into Georgetown. From there we hit a loooong out and back stretch from miles 5-10 where we were enveloped in beautiful fall colors but it was hard to enjoy it because I was spending the whole time wondering where the turnaround point was.  One way to tell how far is by gauging how much faster the runners are going the other way.  If they're going way faster than you, you've got a long way to go still.  If they're running as fast as you, you're almost there.

Where's the turnaround?

I saw on Facebook that an old high school classmate, Erwin, was also in town for the marathon. Found out during the race that he was near mile 11, so I started looking for him. That always makes the race go by faster when you're busy scanning the crowd for someone and it helps you forget the horrible thing you are inflicting on yourself.  I found him behind his camera, and I pulled over to take a quick selfie, exchanged hellos and kept going.

The blue mile, around mile 12, was one of those moments I won't ever forget.  Lining both sides of the course were pictures, each one of a veteran, their name, age, and date of KIA.  Reading name after name and how young they were, along with the sheer number of people who sacrificed their lives for us really began to overwhelm me.  Then I started thinking of my dad, who passed away in May, and my legs got weak and the tears just started flowing.  There were no spectators at this stretch and all the runners were silent; the only sound I could hear was our footsteps. At the end of the blue mile was another long line of volunteers in blue, each holding an American flag.  One runner thanked every flag bearer he ran past in between his breaths, while I heard one of the flag bearers yell out, "It is an HONOR to hold this flag!"  I've never felt so moved and patriotic for this country before in my life.

I made it to 13.1 in a little over 2:30, which is where I figured I would be.  I reached my goal of making it without needing to walk.  I wasn't gunning for a particular time, and the faster I finished, the more pain I'd be in and the longer I'd have to wait for April.  So I decided to just take it all in and stop looking at my GPS for my pace.  I spent the second half taking lots of pictures and thanking the countless marines providing support along the entire course.  I also did a lot of reading.  Everyone had so many inspiring messages on their backs.  But there were too many runners that had pictures of their loved ones who had fallen in combat. There were also more runners carrying more flags than I had ever seen in a single race. Also saw a few barefoot runners.

One of the best parts of the course is where you get to run around the National Mall to the Capitol Building and back, for miles 17-20, and if you look at the course map, well, let's just say it's the hardest part of the course.  I loved running/walking past all these historic buildings.  They were handing out Jelly Belly Sport Beans, which were a welcome change to the Clif Bloks I've been using for the past five or so marathons.  I loved them and think I'm going to pack those moving forward. At this point I also ran into my favorite signs of the race.

America -

Despite the fact that I held back the first half of the race I felt like I had hit the wall at the bridge that takes us back to Virginia.  The mile 20 mark had a throng of females waiting to get their picture taken with a marine which I really got a kick out of.  They sure love a man in uniform...  By now the sun had broken through and temps were touching 70 and my left quad had just given up on me.  It was giving me fits when I tried running and I had to walk more frequently and at this point I was at a 50/50 ratio of walking and running the rest of the way for the final 10k.  There was one more out and back stretch through Crystal City which was lined with spectators and colorful flags and the end of the turnaround had a much welcome fan spraying water on the runners.  Dunkin Donuts was handing out donut holes and that was a welcome surprise at mile 24.

As I approached the finish line, I heard the announcer bellow out, "Here comes Mario Pasamba, of Des Moines - er, Plaines, Illinois!" I waved in recognition of my name and started running too fast as I crossed the finish line and every muscle in my legs locked up on me.  Thankfully I didn't have to really keep moving since there was a crowd of finishers right there, and I lined up to get my medal.  It is a beauty.  They had professional photographers everywhere and got my pic in front of the Iwo Jima statue.

April finished about 20 minutes after I did which gave me a chance to stretch out a bit while I waited for her.  We received typical post race goodies like bananas, water and a snack box but the best was a container of cold, cubed watermelons.  So refreshing.

The road to the finisher's festival was a tortuous half mile away and we shuffled our way towards gear check pickup and traded stories of our runs. Earlier I toyed with the idea of leaving our stuff in the hotel but there would have been no way I would have made it back in time, so I'm really glad we hauled all our stuff with us and that allowed us to take our time to make it through the village.

A guy wearing Ragnar socks was also picking up his gear in the same UPS truck as us so I struck up a conversation with him.  This guy has run 16 Ragnars, and of course he was also a Ragnar ambassador.  He started telling me his Facebook page, and I was like dude, you're RagBear?  I've seen pics of you before!  I know you!  He wears an orange bear suit with a big Ragnar logo on his belly so it's hard not to notice him in the pictures.  We spent the next hour and a half in a crowded Chipotle where I rewarded myself with a steak burrito and headed straight to the airport where I continued to reward myself with my tradition - an Arby's Max.

Even though the entire trip was a short 36 hours, it was one I'll always remember and it's going to be very difficult to top in the inspirational category.  And man was it fun to say oorah.

Registration: $129.69 + $51.88 to transfer
Flight: $146.18 on Spirit
Hotel: Capitol Skyline Hotel $204.96 (split with April)

Race Recap State #6: Texas

Race: GE Irving Marathon
Date: April 4th, 2015
Result: 5:21:25
Charity: Our Children's House at Baylor Irving
Money Raised: $245

So after running the Hogeye marathon on Sunday in Arkansas we drove down to the middle of the state the next day to take the kids to a diamond mine and play some real life Minecraft while I worked on getting my calves back to normal with my best friends Foam Roller and Tiger Tail.  After a night in Texarkana where we encountered the friendliest hotel staff of all time at the Hampton Inn & Suites, we drove on to the Dallas area where my cousin Antonette and her family graciously put us up for the week.

The day before the race we drove over to Luke's Locker, a local running store, for packet pick-up. I ran in and grabbed our bibs, a souvenir visor and some Margarita Clif Bloks.  We toured a bit more of Dallas and checked out the World Aquarium.  I took every opportunity to sit down while the kids explored every exhibit in the building. We then took in a few innings of a Rangers exhibition game against the Mets. Another MLB park crossed off the list! Maya and the family made it on the scoreboard after I tweeted a picture hashtagged with #rangersscoreboard. I took the opportunity to visit the State Fare booth where everything offered up was deep fried. Since they were out of deep-fried S'mores I settled with funnel cake fries and deep fried twinkies.  Not an ideal pre-race dinner but since I wasn't going to really race tomorrow I figured why not.

Pasta dinner

The morning of the race once again I failed to eat or drink anything at all, and missed the official 7:30 gun time because the bathroom line inside the convention center at the start line was actually longer than the women's line.  Mae, who was running the 5k at 8am, made it through her line faster than I did.  By the time I ran outside it was already 7:32 and the other marathoners had already taken off.


I headed out alone across the start line as the half marathoners hung back and waited for their 7:40 gun time.  It was kind of cool having my own personal start.  I took off at a 9 minute pace as I caught up to the back of the packers.  Early in the course my left hip felt pretty tight and just never loosened up.  Other than that I felt pretty good and I kept an aggressive pace until I simply couldn't anymore, around 10 miles in.

This was as scenic as it gets

Remember in the Flintstones when they would drive somewhere and the background would repeat over and over?  That was kind of what it's like to run this course.  It took us through miles of corporate parkways, a bit of a park trail, and a looooong out-and-back stretch through an upper-middle class neighborhood for miles 13-21.  I felt lousy during this long stretch and there weren't a lot of runners around and spent a good percentage of the time walking as my feet started to hurt more and more. I think I taped my feet too tightly and was really feeling it. There were so many intersections that we had to cross that it was the only thing keeping me running in the back half was crossing each intersection where the cops were holding up traffic for us. It also helped a bunch seeing Mae at this part of the course as she chased me around in our car.

Final stretch

Although the scenery wasn't the greatest, I was thrilled that the course was pretty damn flat and the temps were in the mid 50's for most of the race.  It did get a little warm by the end but considering the temperature got into the upper 80's earlier in the week I didn't really mind.  The volunteers were very nice and there was plenty of water and Gatorade but the cups were so tiny (jello-shot sized) I would have to get 2 of each cup at the stations.  No biggie, though.  There were very few spectators, and since it was an out and back you'd see them cheering enthusiastically on the way out and much less enthusiastically on the way back in.

At mile 25 a runner pushing her grandmother in a stroller with a sign that read "Stop Polio" passed me and that inspired me to at least start jogging.  I was able to jog the last quarter mile where the kids had just arrived in time at the finished since they just finished up Easter egg hunting and were upset the bounce house had just closed at 1pm.  I received my medal and a bottle of water which I promptly lost, and headed right off to get some Hard Eight BBQ not too far away.

At Hard Eight BBQ after the race

I was surprised with how normal I felt after the race and the day after and drove 11 out of the 15+ hours home.  I didn't really push too hard and I could have run this one much faster but with the fear of relapsing and since I really was in no condition to do this, I'm ecstatic that I was just able to finish and will have many more opportunities in the future to PR.

Race registration: $95 + $10.45 service fee
Flight: N/A
Hotel: N/A

Race Recap: State #5: Arkansas

Race: Hogeye Marathon
Date: March 29th, 2015
Result: 5:46:38
Charity: Jackson Graves Foundation
Amount Raised: $10

"Where I go, I just don't know, I've got to got to gotta take it slow"

The Chili Peppers did two things for me here in Fayetteville - they made a great song to run to and they gave me the mantra I needed to get Arkansas crossed off my list.

21 days ago on the weekend I was to run my 20-miler I got hit with the flu and didn't do it.  I spent the next two days in bed and the third at the doctor's office, where I found out I had fluid in my right lung.  On the way home I immediately started googling "pneumonia two weeks before marathon" and got some not-so-encouraging results.  Five days of Azithromycin and a week of chest pain later, I figured this would be my first DNS.  But the week of the race I had put in a 4 miler and felt good enough to give it a shot.

All-American Pasta!

We broke up the drive down to two legs and we made it to St. Louis without stopping once.  The next day was a different story - on the way in on one of those two lane county roads we hit a standstill where cars were backed up as far as we could see.  We had to make it to the Chancellor Hotel by 6pm for packet pickup and it was already 4:30pm and we were still 60 miles out.  After taking a 40 minute detour and with the car running on fumes and Maya desperately needing to go potty, we made it at 6:10pm where they were folding up the tables at the expo but I was still able to grab my bib, timing tags and shirt.

We ate at the Marketplace Grill, a restaurant next to our hotel where I carbed up on a huge bowl of pasta and went straight to bed.  The next morning I made it to the start line feeling exhausted, without breakfast and having left my coffee in the car.  It was a bad feeling. Mae dropped me off and I had half an hour to hang out in the hotel thankfully until the 7:30 start time where it was a chilly 41 degrees out.

Hills all day

The start line didn't have any corrals so runners were bunched all around the intersection of the start line and we just kind of funnelled our way through.  Man, the course was hillier than anything I've ever run on.  I didn't have much in my legs to begin with.  I just tried to take in the scenery and not think about anything.  Three and a half miles in I was already questioning the meaning of life.  It hurt to take deep breaths and the lack of oxygen I was taking in was really taking its effect - a 10 minute mile felt too hard.

The mile markers were so cute.  They were smaller than your average garage sale sign and I probably missed half of them.  There were no clocks on the course either but I didn't really care.  I was already in the back of the pack and the 5 hour pace guy passed me right at the halfway mark where I checked my watch at 2:27:00.

At mile 16 I came out of the park trail and finally saw the fam and started running a bit too hard.  That's where I found my wall.  I bumped my right foot into the ground and my toes immediately curled up and I couldn't walk.  I talked to Mae for a little bit and Marcus asked me, why aren't you running?  I needed about 3 minutes to loosen up the calf and felt a bit of despair when I realized I needed to still do 10 more miles.  But I gave the kids and Mae one last hug and carried on.

I struck up a conversation with a marathon maniac from Tulsa where I learned the details of what it takes to make it to the club - since I'm planning on running two within 16 days I would make the bronze level of their requirements.  I see these maniac shirts more often than any other running club - they help out with lodging and travel too so maybe one day I'll join their ranks.

At mile 19 as the sun continued to beat down in the afternoon where it was now in the mid 70's, I started getting depressed with how long I still had to run.  Normally with optimal health I can run a 7-miler in an hour but at my current pace it was going to take another hour and forty minutes!  I tried offering large sums of money to the EMTs who were patrolling the course for their bikes but no one thought I was serious.  I just had to keep going.  

Finally after five miles of gradual climbing followed by a steep up and down in the final stretch I was about 20 meters from the finish.  I could see Mae and the kids and as I tried one last dash my left calf locked up on me completely.  It became permanently flexed and another step caused me to grimace and stop.  I tried dragging my foot but couldn't put any weight on it at all.  Someone suggested I roll through the finish.  An old lady who was already wearing her medal offered to help me hop across.  I was like, no thanks - I just need my calf to relax.  A volunteer came by and said, I don't know you, but let me help massage it out.  Finally after five minutes of just standing there so close to the finish watching runner after runner finish ahead of me my calf loosened just enough to get me over and done with it.

I cramped badly at the stop sign back there... so close!

On one hand, it sucks to see that I finished near the bottom of my age group but on the other hand, it was a triumph just to finally cross that line to a light round of applause of everyone who saw what was going on and with my state of health.  The kids ran across the finish with me and I got my medal.  Being a dry county I was rewarded with a Pepsi and I didn't stick around long.  We jumped right into the car where Mae drove us back to the hotel and I started my recovery in the swimming pool.

Registration: $95 + $7.50
Flight: N/A
Hotel: Hampton Inn & Suites Springdale $93