Top Of Utah Marathon 2010: There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things…

...and once in a great while, going about it the wrong way will get you where you want to go.

But…

There will be consequences.

The Piper will have to be paid.

I knew that going into the Top of Utah Marathon this year.

My longest run since mid June was 13.1 miles and I knew there was a pretty good chance—almost guaranteed—that the second half of TOU would be difficult and painful.

And what do you know.

The week following the Spanish Fork Half, I ran all of 4 miles hoping to recover as best I could from that race and save as much energy as possible for TOU. However, my 4 mile run ended up being about 30 seconds per mile faster than I wanted, and Friday found me with tired legs. I was anxious enough as it was—you don’t jump back into running after a potential stress related injury by running 13 miles one week and 26.2 the next. There’s supposed to be a gradual build up of the miles, right?

But nobody has made a legitimate argument in favor of my intelligence, so…

Nobody has really argued in favor of my rugged good looks either, but still.

I spent Friday night with my daughter (a student at USU) and actually managed to get a good 4 hours of sleep—a rarity for me the night before a race. Saturday morning she took me to the busses. I forgot and left my “breakfast” in the trunk of the car. Fortunately, a friend offered me half of her pop tart, and then I stumbled across a banana that was about to be tossed about 20 minutes before the start of the race. There’s nothing like starting a race on an empty stomach and I’m glad I was able to dodge that bullet.

About 6 of the first 13 miles were sub-9 and only 2 were on the plus side of 10 (courtesy of bathroom stops). I was feeling pretty good about that, but they all felt slow. Really slow. It wasn’t until I got home and looked at the actual splits that I realized I actually fared pretty well.

At mile 14 I was supposed to meet my good friend Smooth, but because of a bit of a mix up we ended up connecting between miles 16 and 17. From there on in to the finish I was pleasantly entertained, encouraged, and motivated by Smooth. What ended up being about a 2:10 second half could very well have been 3:00. My quads and calves were tired and sore. Each step sent an uncomfortable shock through my legs—it was almost as if all the muscle tissue in my legs had turned to glass and each time a foot would come down that glass was going to break. There were quite a few times I had to walk and while Smooth allowed me that, she was quick to get me running again each time.

Can I just say that running with Smooth is a complete hoot! If you haven't had the opportunity yet, schedule some time when you can—it'll be completely worth it!

As we approached the finish line, Smooth broke off to meet her family and I never got the chance to thank her properly. I owe her, at the very least, one big hug!

Finished in 4:15:57. Went and crashed at my daughter’s and then took in the first, and apparently best, half of the Aggies football game before heading home.

The next couple of weeks will be spent trying to recover and rest up the legs enough so that I can, hopefully, pull another sub-4:00 race out of the St. George hat.