Bob Mann: 2012 Manchester Marathon

Sun Nov 4, 2012

On Sun November 4, 2012, I ran the Manchester City Marathon in Manchester NH. New Hampshire was my 24th state on my quest to run a marathon in all 50 states.

It was a very interesting time leading up to this race. Hurricane Sandy struck the northeast less than a week before the race. While New Hampshire wasn't hit hard and the race wasn't affected, my hometown in New Jersey was hit rather hard. Luckily, my house and property sustained very little damage, but the power was lost until after I departed for New Hampshire. Living in the dark for a while made for a very strange week leading up to the race.

The New York City Marathon was scheduled for the same day, and of course that was ultimately cancelled. In fact, a number of runners initially registered for NYC went up to Manchester at the last minute so that they could run something that day.

I drove up to New Hampshire on Saturday morning. I managed to find a local sports bar right across from the expo to watch some college football after picking up my race packet. Later on I had dinner, and then I retired to my room early to get a good night's sleep.

I woke up in plenty of time on Sunday morning, ate breakfast, checked out of my hotel, and drove over towards the start line. The race started at 8:50am, and that's after gaining an hour for the end of Daylight Savings Time. There was plenty of time to kill. Thankfully, it wasn't terribly cold. I was afraid that November in New Hampshire would be bitter cold, but the temps were around 40 at that hour, which certainly wasn't unbearable. Plus, the Radisson Hotel that served as the expo site was right across the street from the start line, and it was convenient to hang out there until the race began.

I had very little expectations for my performance in this race. First of all, I knew I hadn't trained well enough to compete for a PR. That is becoming a theme for me, since I use it as an excuse for every marathon. But it's true, I just don't put in the mileage to be a good marathoner. My goals for this race, in descending order of importance, were: (a) just finish and check the state off the list; (b) finish ahead of the 4:27 that I did in my first marathon in Chicago in 2005, keeping that my slowest marathon for a little while longer; (c) making this the fastest of my four marathons in 2012; and (d) breaking 4 hours. I figured (a) and (b) were pretty easy, and I thought (c) was certainly doable, since the best of the previous three was only 4:17, in Lake Geneva Wisconsin. I thought (d) was a bit of a reach, based on my somewhat-limited training and my lack of sleep during the chaotic week leading up to the race. But hey, three out of four wouldn't be bad, right?

As the race began, I made sure to hold something back. The last thing I wanted to do was run out of gas too early and end up walking a lot. I did too much walking in my three previous races this year (in Phoenix, Lake Geneva, and Missoula), and I really wanted to run this whole thing. My first mile was 9:28, which might have been a wee bit too slow. But I'd rather start too slow than too fast, so I wasn't unhappy. After that, I picked up the pace a little. The next few miles were 9:14, 9:03, 9:13, 9:12, and 9:01. That 9:01 in the 6th mile would be my fastest of the day. It helped that Mile 6 was mostly downhill.

Oh by the way, the course was quite hilly. I actually didn't know that going in. I'm sure I looked at the elevation profile at some point before the race, probably a couple months earlier, around the time I registered for it. But I didn't remember. Typically I do a bit of research in the days leading up to the race so that I know what I'm up against. But without power at home and general craziness all around during the preceding week, I never got around to that research. So I went into this race more blind than I had to any marathon in a long time. Maybe ever.

Well, whatever. I knew I wouldn't break any records (personal or otherwise) and I knew I could at least finish. I was satisfied to just be somewhere there in the middle, and I'd let the chips fall where they may. After that sixth mile, my pace began to fluctuate wildly, based on the elevation profile of that mile. I crossed the halfway point at about 2:03, and then I knew that my pie-in-the-sky goal of 4 hours would not happen. I don't do negative splits, and I certainly wasn't trained for one here. Not with (likely) a whole bunch of hills still to come.

Sure enough, we began to climb again after about Mile 15. And so did my pace. Mile 18 was steep enough to give me my first mile worse than 10:00 -- all the way down to 10:22.

And by then I was basically shuffling along. Even on the downhills, I didn't have enough gas to pick the pace back up much. Mile 19 was slightly less than 10 minutes (downhill again), but every mile thereafter was slower than 10. Amazingly, I never actually slowed to a walk. Just a continually-slower run. If I can be proud of myself for anything, it's that I never stopped running, in some form or another. Hooray for small victories.

I crossed the finish line in 4:17:43. That makes this race 22 seconds slower than my fastest one of the year in Lake Geneva. Another near miss for me in 2012!

While I am happy to have checked another state off my marathon map and inched closer to the halfway point of my journey, I am somewhat frustrated that the best I could do in 2012, in four attempts, was 4:17. As I alluded to earlier, I realize that I just don't put in enough mileage to be good at marathoning. My speed in shorter distances is fine. Twice this year I have come within 5 seconds of my 5k PR, and just two weeks earlier I came within 25 seconds of my Half Marathon PR. But in four attempts, I haven't come within half an hour of my marathon PR. So yeah, the simple answer is to run more. But I'm not sure I'm willing to do that. I don't want to give up any time spent with my family, and I'm apparently not willing to run insanely late at night or early in the morning to get in extra miles. And since my primary running goal is to finish these 50 states -- and I'm still progressing with that just fine -- it doesn't appear that I feel any sense of urgency to change my training habits. I think I just have to get used to the fact that I am now a guy who runs a 4:15 to 4:20 marathon. So be it.

So, the next marathon I do will mark my halfway point. I'll have to make sure I choose a good one.

And now the photos. Click any image to enlarge.