Run run run run run run run....

Right, after a week on the highly recommended Ricky Hatton diet including a healthy dose of not running and not writing race reports, it's time to write a race report on my experience of the 2016 Berlin marathon.

Training
Training went as good as I hoped. I had a calf tear in January and coupled with lack of diagnosis or sensible rehab, the problems persisted until April. It was the first week of May following a second minor tear that I spent the week slowly building back up around the streets of Munich. Every run was on a knife edge and I was seriously doubting my ability to make Berlin. I had no intentions of running if I wasn't in pb shape let alone the sub 2:30 which I knew clubmates were already talking about. I got through that week, and another week of easy running in Portugal with clubmates and things were finally looking up. The calf was playing ball and I was friends with it again. By mid June I was hitting the longer marathon sessions and 20 milers again, gradually ramping up the milage but still wary of overloading the calf. My fitness wasn't terrible but I had the benchmark of last summer and I knew I had a lot of work to do to catch up with some of the lads but I had to be patient, I didn't force the sessions and had to trust I would peak at the right time.

The consistent training continued into July and August and I was starting to feel in better shape by the week. The mid week 15 miler on a Tuesday was on a hilly trail in Blarney and it was here I really felt the improvements were showing and was getting stronger on the hills each time. There were 5 of us planning on hitting Berlin and I spent a lot of time running alongside them week in week out. It was one of the keys of the cycle, we really helped each other through the sessions and the advantages of having a solid group can't be underestimated. Thursday was our 35 minute tempo, typically 15-20 seconds per mile quicker than marathon pace and we had to always ensure these were controlled and we felt relaxed. Our Saturday morning sessions on the UCC pitches were also gradually getting quicker each week and we all fed well off each others energy and improvements. These were longer reps (e.g 4 x 10 mins) typically around 10 mile race pace and I've always viewed this as part 1 of a single session, part 2 being the following day . The long run on Sunday was always on tired legs but I felt my body adapting the more I ran these and felt fresher each week. As I neared the peak of the cycle I ran an extra 6 miles in the evening hitting marathon distance for the day, a mental boost if anything. The long runs were ran typically 1 minute per mile slower than marathon pace at a relaxed conversational pace, they always seemed to fly by. All of my other running was usually an easy paced double on Monday and Wednesday (7-7:30 pace) and depending on how I felt I'd either take Friday off or do 1 short run.

In terms of racing, I was happy with the buildup races and felt they played a big role in solidifying my confidence coming into the marathon. In July I ran my first race since April, a 5 miler in Ballycotton coming in 4th in 27:14, a decent reflection of where I was at. In mid August I came 2nd in Clonmel in 1:13:02 with training partner John taking an impressive win. A few weeks later in my final race before the marathon, I finally ducked under the 16 minute barrier for 5k running 15:55 in a local race here in Cork. That for me was a major boost coming off a 95 mile week and at that point I just felt I was ready. I knew I needed to just mind myself, get to the line healthy and I'd be giving myself the best possible chance of a good result in Berlin. At this point too I was getting close to my lightest weight all year around 9 st 8 lbs. It does require a bit of effort in food choices and cooking at home but I think there's good bang for your buck for each pound lighter you can get without jeopardizing performance. Disclaimer: I don't condone crash dieting to run a good race, finding the right race weight is completely individual and should be a very slow process. There's a fine line between performance gain and performance hinderance.

As with all cycles, the much maligned achilles injury struck a few times through the cycle. Being the eternal optimist that I am, I always tried to view them as a chance to step back and absorb the training, a little warning from my body to ease back a bit and I think I managed them all very well. Generally whenever I felt the dull ache, I knew it was a flareup so I immediately backed off and in 1-3 days I was fine again. It takes a lot of discipline, it's very tempting to convince yourself it's nothing and you run through a session only to compound the injury but you have to see the bigger picture at the time. All that said, and I've said it enough at this stage, I need to really focus more on preventing these flareups rather than reacting to them. Anyway, that's for me to worry about. Other than that the weekly deep tissue rubs on a Sunday evening kept me on top of the rest and thankfully I had no other major injury concerns. Christ, I haven't even began the race report and I've written a book.

Mileage peaked at 95 compared to 100 last cycle but I didn't go chasing 100 just for the sake of it. At this stage I know my achilles is more likely to flare when running over 90 miles per week and those 5-10 miles extra (of easy running) weren't going to make a major difference. Once I was getting in the key sessions of the mid week long, tempo, grass intervals and long run, I knew I would be fine. Consistency is absolute key, erratic training just doesn't cut it when it comes to the marathon. I hit my peak milage 3 weeks out and ramped down the volume while maintaining that bit of intensity and I feel I got it just about right in terms of freshness on race day. The last 5 weeks in terms of milage were 93, 95, 78, 64, 54 (including the race).

Targets
Note the plural. There was no single target for me, I've made that mistake before. Last year in Frankfurt I ran 2:36:56. Talk of running a sub 2:30 would mean taking 7 minutes off that. You don't need to tell me that's ambitious but I said I'd just leave it sitting there, in the corner like a bold child. Coming into the end of August and having a better sense of my shape, a clearer target started to emerge in my head, 2:32. That would be 5 minutes off the pb and still a tall order but absolutely achievable. Week by week and session by session that target was shedding it's blurry veil as we crept closer to the day. It was becoming more and more obtainable for me assuming the uncontrollables kept at bay. Even the 2:30 was starting to whinge a little louder at this stage. Two of my training partners were still firmly targeting the 2:30 but I stayed cautious and didn't commit. On the last Saturday before the race the coach who had been quiet about targets until now, told the 3 of us to go for the 2:30. I kind of expected that and while still feeling it was quite ambitious I agreed we were all in close enough shape, close enough to go for it anyway and if we came up short we'd still be sitting happy with a healthy new pb. So with all of that I went into the race with 3 potential outcomes. Perfect: Sub 2:30. Great: 2:32. Good: PB. Anything else, inevitable disappointment and possibly firing a chair into a wall. The latter outcome really wasn't there my mind though if I'm being completely honest.

Taper
The taper went as well as I could have hoped. Though a fair amount of boredom, paranoia and trepidation, there were no niggles or sickness and I hit the last few sessions feeling great. The final session, 2 miles at race pace (5:43 m/m) on the Tuesday before the marathon, I felt really good. That session is, quite unbelievably, the first time we ran intentionally at race pace for the entire cycle. I'd be lying if I said that didn't yield concerns coming into the week of the race. I look at a lot of my peers and they're all doing a lot of training at race pace but whenever I get these doubts I have to reassure myself that this approach has produced excellent results in the club. I had to trust the pace would feel comfortable on the day and I was confident it would.

Pre-Race
I travelled over on the Friday from Dublin and bumped into my clubmate Claire (who ran a fantastic 2:38) and Gladys Ganiel (2:39) at the airport who were travelling together. It was also great to catch up with TRR who was on a mission with his better half to drink Berlin dry, a real pity he couldn't make the line along with Krusty but we'll be seeing more of them no doubt.

I was staying with my clubmate and Frankfurt training partner John in an AirBnB apartment. My 2 other clubmates were staying nearby in another AirBnB. First time using it and I have to say it was fantastic, so much cheaper and we had a great apartment in a central location, 650m from the Brandenburg gate. Relaxed Friday night and had a big bowl of meaty pasta. Met an elderly couple in the restaurant and within 10 seconds I was holding a note with their contact details and an invitation to come stay in their house for the Boston marathon, gobsmacked.

Saturday morning and I had a bit of a sleep in following a restless night because of some vicious encounters with a gang of mosquitos who were trying to sabotage my race. I caught one right in the act in the middle of the night and I flew out of bed. "Hey!! I need that blood to carry oxygen to my muscles" so I spent maybe an hour prowling around the room with a fashion magazine. I killed all but one and went back to sleep. The one mosquito that was left administered quite few more blood extractions before morning broke. Bastard.

Before breakfast, myself and John decided to head out for a 20 minute jog to loosen the legs up a bit. It was shortly after 10am and we had planned to meet our 2 clubmates at the expo at 12. So donned in our shorts and t-shirts I grabbed the key and we headed outside. Just as I slammed the door shut I stopped to think and I said to John "I wonder if that key that's stuck on the inside of the door will stop us getting back in". He just looked at me with a blank expression. I put the key in the door and tried to open it. It's not working. I agree John, we should have removed the key on the inside but still, a fairly punishing door locking system. John's arms are already slumpmed on his head in a state of disbelief. We are locked outside of our AirBnB apartment yet we have a key. We have no phone, no money, nor a contact number for our host and we need to collect our race numbers. This is a minor pickle.

I saw a gap in the window but it was restricted, John is small but there was no way he was getting in there despite me trying to convince him though I was really trying to convince myself. The gap was about 3cm. Ok we've exhausted all avenues, the door is definitely not opening and we are not going to fit through a pathetic gap in a window. What's next?

We headed out onto the street, with no real plan and wandered into a nearby opticians who thankfully had good english. I explained my situation, that we didn't need any glasses but had a marathon related emergency. They were decent humans and offered the use of their phone. I had no phone number for the AirBnb host so I first needed to log into my email to get his number. I managed that after asking for a laptop and also after praying to jesus that I had 2 step verification turned off, which I did. I got the hosts number and punched it into the phone, pleased with my controlled management of the situation. This is it, we're saved. To my horror, the guys phone was switched off. No! The worst possible case of him being out of the country crossed my mind. We jotted down his number on a piece of paper anyway and could now see that the optician staff were getting pretty wary of the 2 distressed Irish guys in their running shorts hanging around their shop. I think they wanted us to leave.

I had another idea. Using the opticians laptop and aware that he's now getting slightly impatient, I quickly logged into Facebook and sent the our clubmates a message telling them to come to our address. I'm not sure what that was supposed to do but it was just a general SOS and maybe one of them could do karate on the door. We thanked the opticians and vowed it would be the first place we return to if we ever needed glass or sunglasses in Berlin.

Now we wait. So we waited. And we waited. John was getting pretty antsy now saying he was hungry and he might die if he didn't eat. We were standing at a street corner near our apartment to stay in the sunshine and time was just slowly ticking by. We couldn't believe the lads hadn't seen the Facebook message yet, they had been on it all morning posting rubbish. It was now well past noon so we assumed they'd finally suspect there was trouble in Chinatown when we didn't show up to the expo. It was getting grim now, there was an air of defeat and John was already talking about smashing in the door, fairly extreme I thought at this stage but didn't rule it out either. I was fairly keen to get the race number collected and hold it in my hand, but I knew things would work out...wouldn't they?

There I was, leaning up against a wall, squinting from the glare of the midday sun and solemnly scraping a piece of stone against a wall when I looked at the ground and what's that? Folded up in a neat little square as if it had just partaken in a shady drug deal was a real ten euro note. What the! I unfolded it and held it up to the sun and I leaped with joy. John! we're saved. Well ok, we're not saved but we can eat. John didn't share my elation, not one bit. I said I'd go find us food with my newfound wealth and John would stay at the corner (now fondly known as tenner corner). I walked off but when I got around the corner I started running, I just didn't want John to spiral further if he knew I was after getting a run in and he didn't. I found a supermarket nearby and bought the essentials, 4 rolls, a packet of ham, a packet of congealed chicken and a packet of cheese. I had to do a lot of maths while walking around, I couldn't possibly take the embarrassment of getting to the checkout and having to bring something back. It came to about 9.60 in the end which was a great result so off I ran with the goods, hopeful that the situation has improved.

I arrived back and the mood was still as bleak. I really hoped the lads would have turned up by now but it was just lonely old John looking like a homeless runner. We might actually have to smash the door in. I said we'd eat our rolls and then go try ring the number again. The rolls went down really nice but the chicken was disgusting so I only had 2 slices of that. A while later and a yellow taxi comes slowly around the corner with two grinning monkeys in the back. It was our clubmates who thought the whole situation was hilarious, which to be fair it kind of was.

They came back to the apartment with us and for some reason wanted to try open the door themselves and also inspected the window and came to the same conclusion that not even a baby hobbit would fit through there. I got hold of one of their phones and dialed the number I wrote down earlier hoping for a better response this time. Ring ring. Yes, he's answered! I slowly explained our situation to the host and without me even finishing the sentence (you'd almost swear this has happened before) he chirps in. "Oh that's no problem guys, just use the second entrance". It's right on the other side and brings you into the bathroom". Without even replying I looked in horror at John and pointed to the other door, which to be completely fair is the entrance to somebody else's apartment and happens to have a side door into ours. The other clubmates processed to burst their holes laughing as John put the key in and opened it. I couldn't help but laugh too but it was more a sense of overwhelming relief. John later admitted thoughts had crossed his mind of sleeping on the streets of Berlin and explaining to his family why he didn't run the marathon. My brain didn't get quite that far.

Alright, this report has gotten way out of control, I didn't mean to go into so much detail of the non-race stuff but it's a funny story and had to be told so look I'll post it now and finish part 2 later. For the rest of the day we just hopped into a taxi to the expo which was a very quick in and out job (that's what she said) and then we went for lasagne, bit of coffee shop lounging and walked around a small bit, but not too much. I bumped into EagRouge also who we all know had a terrific race, he was with his kids and looking very relaxed, I got a sense he was about to do something special. In the evening we relaxed with a home cooked meal of chicken and sweet potato in the apartment, enjoyed with some much appreciated comic relief on Netflix with the movie "I Love You Man" starring Paul Rudd and Jason Segal which I've seen before but still a good laugh. I headed off to bed around 10:30pm but not before a quick sweep of the room with my fashion magazine to execute any potential blood lifters.

This brings us nicely into race day, coming in part 2...

(again really sorry that this contains absolutely no reporting on the actual race)

Stick on the kettle or fill a glass of ribena, it's time for the highly anticipated part 2 of the Berlin Marathon race report. Some critics say it's destined to be a flailing disappointment and I think they might be right. I'm nervous. I apologise for the delay, I'm moving house. That is a terrible excuse really but it's all I've got. Honestly though I really I am moving house, not literally moving the house but moving into a new one, with solar panels. Despite not being an actual race report, part 1 seemed to go down much better than anticipated so I'll probably have to exaggerate a lot of part 2 to ensure standards are kept in line.

Race Morning
25th September. It's race morning and the sunlight is annoyingly seeping through the gap between the curtain and window ledge, causing me to wake up before my alarm. There's a soft tapping on my arm and my eyes slowly open. It's Emilio Estavez from the hit movie the Mighty Ducks. "Emilio Estavez! what are you doing here of all place and of all mornings?" I mumbled. "I'm just here to exaggerate your race report. Best of luck in the race". And with that he handed me a hockey puck and bounced off on a pogo stick. That's weird I though but I shook it off and got up out of the bed. I won't exaggerate any more I promise.

It's 6am and my sleep was a little broken as I had to get up in the middle of the night to murder mosquitos again. They were whizzing around me all through the night, taunting me about the marathon. I don't even want to talk about it anymore, zero kills for me yet a trillion bites received. With the race starting at 9:15am my plan was to get up at 6am and have my porridge and then maybe, just maybe I'd get back to sleep until about 7:30am (like last year in Frankfurt) and steal some extra zzz's. I stumbled into the kitchen in my underpants and there was John, in his underpants holding a bag of Flavahans porridge. I had my Wyldsson porridge with me. We had a discussion on the merits of making just one large bowl and I offered to cook it up. John uses water, I use milk so we agreed on half and half. This went well so down I sat with a big massive bowl of porridge and banana and I threw it into me. I didn't have a coffee as I was planning on more sleep. So off I went back to bed and fell asleep until 7:30am. I woke up for the 2nd time that morning a little more refreshed than earlier and I hopped out of the bed. This is it now, it's real. I had some toast, a beetroot & berry drink, a dioralite and a couple of coffees and I was feeling very full altogether, but very well fuelled. I donned the Leevale singlet and popped a gel in my pocket along with some jelly beans. It goes without saying that I put on shorts, socks and runners too but I just wanted to make it clear I didn't just run in my singlet.

Before I left, I threw on the old reliable psych-myself-up tune, "Survival" by muse and I looked over some notes I had written on the plane on the way over. I had jotted down each 5k split, what time I expected to be there at and a little comment on how I might be feeling or what to expect. For example, the 10k note said something like "Take a sip of water and pop some beans. Feeling completely relaxed. How good does it feel to run a 35:xx 10k split in the marathon and feeling so comfortable?". Then at around 25k the note was something like "Expect things to start feeling tough, take a gel if you need". It's a lot of obvious stuff and might seem completely corny but the idea being that when I passed those point I could call upon my expectations and if it's aligning with reality it just reenforces confidence and that I have a plan. I've decided for a laugh I'm actually going to pull those original notes up on my phone and reference them in the report as I hit the splits.

We left the apartment shortly after 8am (checked there was no key on the inside and tied a key to my shorts) and off we went jogging towards the line. About 600m later we hit the masses at the Brandenburg gate and were reduced to a walk as the crowds were already forming in a very large crowd formation. There was a lot of walking in tiny steps and squashed together like animals to the slaughter. I suppose this was probably to be expected when it's one of the most popular marathons in the world. We eventually made our way to the bag drop where I dropped off my bag with ease and we had about 45 minutes to the start now. There was another huge squash to get into the start area but myself and John squeezed through a fence but other people were doing it too so....that makes it ok.

The weather was looking good. Clear blue skies, the sun is out but it's quite cool and fresh, temperatures expected to rise mid morning to 22 in the afternoon. Not a breeze, perfect.

John was a bit anxious to get to the start and we were doing this sort of run/walk thing but I really didn't want to be stressing I knew we had lots of time and since we were in the front pen I knew there would be a lot less congestion there. We didn't really get a proper warmup done but that didn't bother me too much, we'd certainly walked enough. I must have stopped for a pee about 4 times along the way, thankfully there were loads of wooded areas. I don't even want to know what sort of sordid things were happening in those woods that morning but I'd say it has done wonders for the fertility of the area.

We finally got to coral A and met Owen our clubmate and the 3 of us were planning on working together. It was the first time I had been in a pen where you could actually move around freely so I did some ballet style twirls but I don't think the other lads were very impressed. The nice thing about it too was you could exit and come back in, which is exactly what I did when pee #5 came calling about 5 minutes before the start. I couldn't believe how close we were to the front, maybe 4/5 rows back from the start line and there was an incredible atmosphere in the air. I was a little bit intimidated by the elite looking runners around me but then I remembered I had earned the right to be in there too, so I punched one of them right in the eye. Another one of my exaggerations there, I lied earlier about that being the last one and I didn't really do ballet twirls either. It's almost time and the announcer called out all the elites (saw our clubmate Claire on the bigs screen with all the elites which was great to see) and then it was 1 minute to go. I had a look down at my 2 pace bands with 5k splits on them. One was for 2:30 and the other for 2:32. Last year my pace bands were too optimistic, this year I wanted them to actually be useful. We agreed as a group to take 2k at the front each since the markers were in km's. Well that plan lasted for all of...2k I think.

The Actual Race

Ok Conor, focus, seriously focus. I have to admit I wasn't feeling terribly great standing there, I was feeling so bloated from the breakfast and the nervous energy was palpable. Somewhere in the midst of all that noise too was a calm confident voice that was telling me the training was done and there's no reason why I can't go out there and do a job today. A long, long countdown and then bang! Flanked by tall golden leaved trees in the middle of the Tiergarden, a frenzied stampede of maniac runners like a giant steam train, hurl down the asphalt towards the victory monument on a long journey through the streets of Berlin. Finally the race report begins. Insert 1 coin to continue.

5k - 17:54
It's easier to do this by 5k splits since the markers were in km and the pace band too, but I still love miles. It took me about 3 or 4 km's to get into any sort of decent rhythm. Despite being so close to the start I was baffled by the amount of people ahead of us, where the hell did they come from? are they extras? What was even more confusing was the fact we were passing them all so quickly. My best guess is people from behind getting caught up in a whirlwind of emotion and going out like the clappers. I passed one guy breathing so heavily at around 2k, he sounded (and looked) fit for A&E and was losing pace quickly. Weird. Maybe he thought it was a 5k I dunno, I didn't think about it for long, but long enough to remember and later write about it. A quick glance down at the watch as mile splits were popping up and we were hitting around 5:45 m/m pace though I really didn't plan on trusting the watch too much today, I was going by pace band. I felt ok for the first 5k, moving well and breathing relaxed. I also kept an eye on the HR, now just over 150bpm. I had no intention of running to a HR, I always race by feel and for me it's just an additional feedback metric knowing that from previous experience I can sustain around 160bpm for a marathon. If anything it's more of an assurance policy for the latter stages of the race. The 3 of us were still working well in a small group with the plan of taking 2k at the front now completely out the window. I tried to say something every now and then to the lads, more of a mental thing than having an actual conversation, just reassures us that the pace is comfortable. I said something along the lines of the plan being out the window and whoever was feeling good just take the reigns, this worked much better with everyone pitching in their time at the front. We hit the first 5k mat at 17:54, slightly outside 2:30 pace but a decent start and into my stride now. Took a sip of water from the frustratingly hard to drink out of plastic cups, still water got in and that's all that matters. I lost a few meters on the lads, I'm a terrible water drinker so I had to up the pace to catch them just after the timing mat.

Mile splits (GPS, possibly dodgy)
1. 5:48
2. 5:42
3. 5:40

10k - 17:54 (35:48)
Geographically I couldn't tell you where we were, and that goes for every part of the course. I really had little interest in sightseeing at the time. Hitting the 10k mat and the note I jotted down on the airplane popped into my head and I afforded a little smile. 35:xx just as planned and it did feel good to see that split on my watch and I really did feel comfortable and relaxed as planned. The prophesy has been fulfilled, it was a god damn miracle! I should be on a television show on the paranormal channel. But seriously, it's not too long ago that time alone would have been a big 10k achievement for me, I really do feel grateful and privileged to have gotten this far when I think about it now. At this stage the 3 of us were part of a now decent sized pack, no doubt the majority of the group hungry for a 2:30 and we weren't far off pace, 16 seconds to be exact. I was also keeping an eye on the 2:32 pace band and knew I was comfortably inside that as it stands. I'm pretty sure it was this split I first saw Krusty and he gave us all a great shout out. I saw him 2 or 3 times on the course along with TRR and was great to get a that support from fellow runners I have huge admiration for. I took a sip of water at the station and then fumbled inside my back pocket to take the jelly beans like my airplane note had told me to do. I really should have opened them beforehand as my sweaty fingers fumbled with the packet before I got impatient and I tore the top off with my mouth. I was already losing a good bit of ground on the group due to my jelly issues but eventually I got 2 into my hand and flung them into my gob, making sure to chew this time so they wouldn't come out my nose in chunks like in Frankfurt. You learn a little something from every marathon you see. My biggest lesson last year was "chew the beans". I had to again turn on the boosters to catch up to the lads and I could see John look around in confusion when I rejoined, howya John. Anyway 10k and all going well though absolutely under no illusions, this race hasn't even started yet. Technically, yes it has but, you know. YOU KNOW WHAT I MEANT!


Mile splits
4. 5:43
5. 5:43
6. 5:43

15k - 18:03 (53:50)
Still moving well and feeling good, the group of now maybe 15 guys and we're coming up to the 10 mile mark well on track. We're slightly off 2:30 pace but no need to radically change anything when the going is good and the group working well together. I took my fair share at the front as did the lads but I also took my fair share at the back taking shelter, these are the benefits of a group and while putting in your own shift is important, you should be able to take a little back too and grab your breathers when you need them. The 3 of us were still running closely at the front of the group, we tended to call each other out when pace felt it was increasing which was great, we just had to be a little vigilant especially in the early stages. When I think about it now, I was feeling really good knowing I was about 30 seconds outside 2:30 pace. Was there potential to increase the pace and try claw back those seconds now instead of later? No doubt I could have but at what cost? A big one I would say. Effort would certainly have increased and I'd potentially be breaking away from the group and my clubmates and running solo, not to mention an increased likeliness of burning out at the business of the race. I have to ask these questions because I want to learn from each race but in hindsight I think it was the right strategy at the time and I think the group played a big part that day. I was well inside 2:32 pace with HR at a steady 155 and as I mentioned earlier, this was a very satisfactory outcome for me.

Mile splits
7. 5:35
8. 5:45
9. 5:35

20k - 17:47 (1:11:37)
We hit the 10 mile mark at just over 57 minutes and according to my airplane notes I'm moving well and I can keep this up. Thanks airplane Conor. Coming to the 20k mark and we're almost half way and we have run our quickest 5k split though I have no idea at the time. All I know is I'm feeling as good as I could have expected coming towards the halfway mark. Tiredness starts becoming a factor now, nothing catastrophic just a slow creeping of fatigue into the legs which is completely expected and acknowledged but I'm still confident I can pull off something very similar in the 2nd half. I know we're heading for around 75 mins for the half and happy with how we controlled that first half.

Mile splits
10. 5:46
11. 5:43
12. 5:40

25k - 18:03 (1:29:40)
We hit halfway in 1:15:33 and I was pleased with that. Airplane note tells me I'm feeling great and to just simply do it all again, focus hard and stay relaxed. At halfway though I had to ask myself the question, do I want to risk a great time for an excellent time and try pull back those 30 seconds? Based on how I was feeling, did I have a low 74 half in me? My gut feeling was caution, I'm in a really good rhythm right now, it feels just about sustainable for another half so I wasn't willing to risk increasing the effort, just keep going as you are and see how it plays out. The legs said "warning: do not increase pace" but they always lie to get out of doing work, this was a mental discussion. The group was still going well but it was around the 25k marker when Owen was running alongside me. He turned to me and said "I'm starting to work hard now". Not good I thought. Because we still had a good distance to go I didn't want to insult his intelligence telling him to hang in there and it'll be fine. I really wasn't sure how to respond other than agreeing it was starting to feel difficult and "just an hour to go". Maybe that helped, maybe it didn't but to me an hour didn't sound that long and I was still feeling ok. Not great, not terrible, ok.

Mile splits
13. 5:37 (halfway in 1:15:33)
14. 5:36
15. 5:52

30k - 17:59 (1:47:39)
In was in these few mile where unfortunately Owen fell off the pace and I found myself running alongside John. The large group itself was starting to diminish and scatter out along the road. We're truly entering the business end of the race now and this is where the training is tested. John was dictating the pace at this stage, I was working that bit extra to keep up the pace and we're down to maybe 4/5 guys, it's a very hazy patch so I'm not sure what else to say. The splits suggest I was moving pretty well here but I was definitely feeling the tiredness creep further up my legs towards my...arms. The pace band I was focussing on now was firmly the 2:32, you may call that defeatist but it was my gut instinct at the time and felt like the realistic goal. At 30k I was about 25 seconds inside it and while HR is still reassuringly constant, I'm tiring and kind of glad I didn't increase the pace earlier. My airplane prophecy suggested there would be a bad patch coming soon and to take a gel if I feel like it. I took the caffeine gel at the 30k mark along with water as usual, went down fine and I didn't actually fall off the group this time. It was probably around now that I saw TRR who gave us a great shout, maybe it was later on actually but still he took a great photo which I'll post at the end purely because it makes me look good and John look bad. It's really a great boost to see familiar faces support you at a foreign marathon. I was lucky to have familiar faces this time but If you don't have any at your marathon you can easily conjure them up using your brain by imagining familiar faces on random strangers. That's a free tip from me to you.

Mile splits
16. 5:29
17. 5:42
18. 5:44

35k - 18:17 (2:05:55)
Slowest 5k split yet but not a dramatic decrease in pace, it's pure fatigue kicking in. Breathing was fine and generally throughout the race, along with the HR it was very consistent and controlled. Somewhere here was my rough patch and in a slightly perverse way it was welcomed. I was waiting for it so I could get through it and then kick on. It really didn't last too long and I can't pinpoint the miles either but I definitely struggled at times. I was still always moving pretty well and just trying to stick with John, a lot of it is mental too. We hit the 20 mile mark and it wasn't even acknowledged though we were both probably thinking the same thing, here we go, the pain train. The Airplane notes told me that at 20 miles it's just a 35 minute Thursday track tempo left. I shouldn't have made that note, it's not what I wanted to hear at 20 miles. As we neared the 35k water stop John now had a bit of a gap on me, maybe 3-4 meters and all I thought was what's new, the fecker is away from me again. As we got to the actual water stop I was suddenly after catching him, details hazy whether he slowed or I picked it up but we're running alongside each other again and we've 7km to go. At 35k my airplane self tells me to take water and beans and it's just one more lap of the marina on a fresh Sunday morning. I took some beans and I'm starting to feel good.

Mile splits
19. 5:43
20. 5:51
21. 5:51

40k - 18:20 (2:24:14)
I was really starting to tire but as you can see from the 5k split, the pace didn't really slow dramatically and I was holding it together. It was around mile 22 I realised I was now running solo. The tables had finally turned and I had pulled away from John for a change, for the first time ever actually. I had no idea where he was relative to me but my instinct was not very far away. To quote a clubmate, John's "as gritty as they come". I was completely focussed now on getting through the last few miles and thinking back now, I think I was loving it. Though the last 6 miles of a marathon can be absolute hell, the exhilaration and the rush is indescribable, particularly alongside a raucous Berlin crowd. Breaking the last 6 miles down into 3 x 2 mile blocks helped me mentally...22...24...26. You know? A guy in a black onesie came up alongside me at some point and he was looking really strong so I just clung to him though he eventually pulled away, it was of little concern. I was happy with how I was moving given the effort levels. Pace, heart race, pace band or any of that didn't matter during this patch, it was listening to my body, getting the effort level right and making sure I got to that line as efficiently as I could. When I did hit the 40k mark I had a glance at my pace band, in fact I had about 4 glances because sums were difficult at the time. According to the pace band I needed to be hitting the 40k mark in 2:24:05 in order to run a 2:32. I crossed the mat in 2:24:13, that's 8 seconds to make up. My immediate thought was leave nothing out there, to put the hammer down and hunt down those 8 seconds, and make them pay. Either way I knew I was on for a great time and a big PB but I was so so close to dipping under the 2:32. I've never felt so good hitting the 40k mark in a marathon so no better time to wind up for a strong finish. I got another shout 23 mile maybe from a very vocal Krusty, it was much appreciated so I threw the thumbs up his way. I didn't recall my airplane notes here but the note is pretty entertaining regardless "give it all you've got. You've given yourself the best possible shot, leave nothing out there. Dig deep. Take a sip of water only if you need to". I didn't take a sip of water, I was done with water but I was digging deep and I had given myself a pretty good shot.

Mile splits
22. 5:39
23. 5:42
24. 5:50

42k - 7:32 (2:31:46)
I felt completely in the zone and I was making ground on a lot of guys ahead of me, I picked up maybe 5 or 6 places up over those last few km, including that chap in the black onesie who got away from me earlier. The crowd were just amazing today and it felt like an extra hand on my back pushing me for those last 2k. I was soaking up all the support and moving so well. I had no idea if I was going to claw back those few seconds or not. I was genuinely enjoying that last stretch I felt so good, there was nothing stopping me between here and the finish line. Suddenly it's 41km and its only 1km to go, it's nothing! The finish in Berlin is exceptional. The towering Brandenburg gates come into view just after the 41km mark as you turn the corner. The boisterous spectators flank the wide open street urging you every last step of the way. I was somehow able to actually pick it up over that last km, I was gunning for the clock and got into a mini battle with one of the guys from our earlier group. This probably helped my cause a lot. We were jostling back and forth, my legs again felt slightly possessed like the finish last year but the difference this time was I was able to increase the pace. Coming under the Brandenburg gate I somehow instinctively knew I had done enough to get the time and embarrassingly raised a fist in the air. I slightly die inside looking back at the video but I was hugely pumped knowing I had managed to do it. There was still a good 200m or so to go after the gates and the clock came into view and then I knew for sure I had a bit of a cushion. My jostling partner had the legs on me and pipped me at the line but I didn't care then. I cross the line in 2:31:46. I had done it. A shiny new PB by over 5 minutes and I ran the second half in 76:13. 107th overall. Elated. A time nobody can ever take from me. What a feeling.

Mile splits
25. 5:39
26. 5:42
0.4. 2:24 (@ 5:18)

Strava link

The Aftermath

I gathered myself for a moment and my first thought was to turn around to wait for John. I thankfully didn't have to wait for long, he came in just under a minute later in 2:32:41 and another big PB. Owen came in just under 2:38 which is still a fantastic time but understandably he was disappointed not to PB. I hung around and congratulated my beaming clubmate Claire on her terrific 2:38 pretty much qualifying her for the worlds next year. I then met EauRouge who we know absolutely smashed his PB and we both congratulated each other, pretty smitten with our efforts. I was in wonderland myself, soaking it all up and wandering about like a zombie. I met my clubmate Donal who ran an impressive debut of 2:45 and then met a delighted Rolex (from here) with another brilliant PB of 2:45 and it was great to have a little post race chat with himself and few other lads from Cork. Following a light massage, I sat with the lads downing a non alcoholic (booo) beer, drowning in the midday sun. I then bumped into another pleased looking boardsie, Duanington who ran a very sensible race, nailed the sub 3 and I really think he has a lot more coming his way having followed his training log.

Myself and John headed to find the boards meeting point but ended up stuck on the wrong side of the street and couldn't cross the road because, you know, there was a marathon on. We grabbed a real beer and a bratwurst and I think I blacked out it was so good, or maybe it was the delirium setting in. We hung there for a while and then decided to go try cross the road but by the time we got to a crossing point we were essentially back at our apartment and there really was no going back. After a good rest we headed out for some evening sun beers with my clubmates in a beer garden very far away. I really don't know how we managed to walk there without complaining once. It was a great evening as we shared stories of our battles and compared emotional wounds. We headed for a delicious asian meal that evening and then met some of the boards crew in an Irish pub for a nightcap. It was great to meet some for the first time including Adrian and overpronator, great guys and always nice to finally put faces to names. I went to bed pretty happy that night, and not just because of all the pints. I was so happy I decided I wouldn't kill any mosquitos, it was open season, take as much blood as you want lads. Not that it would have mattered anyway, I was in a coma within 13 seconds of my head hitting the pillow. Funny enough I didn't get any bites.

We stayed in Berlin until the Wednesday and we were out and about cycling around the city for next few days exploring, learning, eating pizza and guzzling German beer, just as planned. What a fantastic few days, left with a bag of great memories (and smelly gear).

Some Final Thoughts

Clearly I'm more than happy with that result. Not hitting 2:30 was never going to be a bad result and I was prepared for that, for me it'll come in time. Even taking off the chunk I did is more than I expected back at the start of this cycle in May. I joined Leevale 2 and a half years ago with a PB of 2:54. I wouldn't have comprehended back then running a time like that in such a short time but all the elements seemed to have aligned for me and I've been lucky enough to get a great run of training in over those years, major injuries have kept at bay, I have always a great reliable group to train with and a coach that gets the basics right. Each marathon I run, which is 6 now, I'm learning more about myself as a runner and how to execute a marathon race well. There are always things I get wrong but I try focus more on what I got right and try bring it into the next training cycle.

What's next? I don't know right now, the hunger hasn't quite returned but I know it will but it's important to recover well from this and only return to proper training when I'm ready. I don't know when the next marathon will be but that certainly wasn't my last. I'll probably stop logging for a while now but hopefully this has been useful for some people. The training as you can see is fairly predicable and not complicated but that's only the training. The stuff that's individual, managing the niggles, watching for signs of overcooking it, sleep, nutrition and the extra stuff like rubs and foam rolling, they all make a difference too and shouldn't be underestimated.

What a RIDICULOUSLY LONG race report, almost illegal I would say. Sorry for putting you through all of that but I enjoyed writing it even though it's taken about 4 years. I've had my fun and that's all that matters.

Now some people will say the only reason I wrote such a mammoth race report was so I would retain back to back titles of 'Best log of the year' and possibly an attempt to win the highly prestigious 'Race report of the year' title for a first time. And to those people I say....vote for jebuz.

Finally, that photo by TRR. This was about 17/18 miles or so, I really can't be sure but I'll just say that the smile didn't last that long. Clearly just the sight of TRR makes me happy.

adrian522 wrote: »

Do you think you would have faded a bit more if you had pushed on for 2:30 earlier?

I think so Adrian, I reckon that performance was close to my potential on the day and more of a realistic reflection of the training and build up races. There was no doubt a slight fade at the latter stages so I reckon I got the pacing just about right. As always though when you finish strongly in a race you tend to question whether you had more in the tank. I'm not one to dwell over what could have been, that was a very good result and all going to plan there's plenty more to come over the next few years.

Well done yourself on a great race, hope recovery is going well.

Singer wrote: »

Fuxking awesome race and report. Is there a part 3 featuring hilarious escapades after the marathon?

Cheers singer. I'm afraid part 3 would be nowhere near as hilarious as our previous adventures, it was basically me and John cycling very slowly around the city and drinking grog in the sun. It would include a LOT of made of up stuff. Oh but there was this very funny moment when John dropped a pen. You really had to be there.

yaboya1 wrote: »

Class report on a class race.
I think part 2 is better than part 1. Can we have a part 3?
Your attitude and enthusiasm are infectious. It's just after 10:30pm and reading that makes me want to go out for a run.

You have my votes anyway

Congratulations on a superb marathon.

Thanks Yaboya, hope to see you back nailing the 26.2 soon. I wasn't really fishing for votes but looks like it worked either way

AuldManKing wrote: »

Epic and amazing.
Congratulations on brilliantly executing the race.
Plenty of tips in there for us all.

BTW, the guy in the onzie, real or there for exaggeration

Thanks auld fella. Yeah he really was real but instead of a mouth he had four arses and had a tremendous fear of stamps.