Lake Placid Marathon weekend

OK! I survived the Lake Placid Marathon, which featured beautiful High Peaks scenery, hills and heat. The course was challenging and fair – except for the final, excruciating hill climb, which I have been characterizing to family and friends this way: “cruel joke.” Yikes!

Anyway, a marathon runner talking about his or her marathon race can sometimes be as thrilling as listening to a golfer talk about his or her latest round (translation: NOT thrilling), so I will not bore you with the play-by-play details of my entire 4-hour, 12-minute journey. Considering I was out there for so long, that would be way too many paragraphs. Instead, I will provide you with several highlights from the day:

--It was yet another negative-split race for me, something I am getting good at and something of which I am proud: 2:08 for the first 13.1, 2:04 and change for the second 13.1 (Note: My final finishing time was 4:12:36, and was NOT a personal worst, as predicted by my son Joey!). The neg split here was significant in that there were more hills, and certainly more heat, over the second half of the race. So that is a point of pride.

--My first-half plan was altered a bit as our friend Mary had two ladies she was running with, and they asked that I not run with them in fear of making them go too fast. So I set out on my own, thinking I would average roughly 10:00 pace, based on the course and my relative lack of marathon-specific training (as usual).

--The pleasant surprise of the day was running into (Iiterally) Wendy Dorset, mom of XC team member Ian Dorset. Wendy was running her first half marathon were her friend Lisa. I asked her what pace she was looking to run. She said around 10:00. Perfect! So we ran much of the first 11 miles together, and it was quite enjoyable.

--The second half was very hot and the last 5 kilometers featured the two steepest hills on the course. Add to this the fact that I was dealing with a very tight calf (probably strained it early in the race), and it was a tough go. But I never bonked or hit the wall, thanks to well-timed and short walk breaks, and ingesting the unseemly but very effective Gu Mint Chocolate Gels (thanks to my marathon friend Krys for providing those!)

--The finish was on the Olympic speedskating oval in downtown Lake Placid. That was pretty cool. Well, not literally, but you get the idea.

Would I recommend this race? Yes. And no. As a marathon and running event, it was phenomenal. The course was fantastic in its scenery. Much of the course ran on River Road, with the legendary Ausable River providing great company. There were fly fishers, great mountain views and just the general serenity of a backcountry course.

However, if you are looking to run a fast time and a Boston Marathon qualifier, stay away. The course is not certified as a Boston qualifier. And yes, it is challenging. I think it gets a bad rap, though. If you take away the final, cruel joke of a hill – three-tenths of a mile of steep, switchback climbing, ugh, ugh, ugh – the course is not out-of-control tough. Flat and fast? No. Mountainous? Not really that either.

We made a nice family weekend out of it, spending Friday night in Lake George, and Saturday afternoon climbing Whiteface Mountain. On the way home Sunday, we went to the Great Escape amusement park in Lake George. But when I say WE, I do not mean ME. I dropped Heidi and the kids off, pointed the van to the nearest Stewart’s, got me a coffee and then took a nap.

After recovering and trying to get this calf working again, training for NYC 2012 begins in earnest. God willing, I will be on the starting line in November with a large Marist contingent.