California International Marathon 2021 Race Report

 Lodging

We choice an AirBnB downtown. It was just a couple of miles from the finish, buses, and expo. Reviewing the AirBnB would be a whole other post, but it had a full kitchen and that is what I needed.

 

Expo

The expo was super organized. I had my number in under ten minutes, but there were few vendors. I did manage to spend some money, but not a fun expo. It was all business, but they did have multiple spots to take photos.

 

2:55AM wakeup

I need to drink all my fluids 3 hours before the race. Normally, this means that I set an alarm, eat, and go back to sleep, but not this time. Buses loaded so early that 3AM was the true wake up. I ate a breakfast of instant grits topped with a scrambled egg, a banana, 16 oz liquid IV, orange juice and coffee. By the time I finished all that and got dressed, it was time to head to the buses.

 

Buses

The buses were scheduled to boarded 4:45-5:00. I got there at 4:50 and almost all the buses were full. They had beautiful, chartered buses, but I ended up in a school bus, and I felt kinda lucky to get that. This is where I ran into some problems. I desperately had to go to the bathroom, even before I boarded, and I’m not talking #1. The bus ride took something like 45 minutes to go 26 miles, and I was on the verge of crying. Noone sat next to me, so I didn’t even have a distraction. When the bus stopped, this young kid started talking, trying to give us directions and the other passengers rebelled. We were all desperate to go to the bathroom. People started overtalking him saying over and over that they had to go to the bathroom. Finally, he stopped talking and moved out the way, so we could get off.

 

Start Line

There were about a million porta potties, but still a longish line at the one I chose. Disaster was averted by seconds. I used the porta-potty and got directly back in the same line. By the time I finally finished, I had about a half an hour till the start. It didn’t seem to make sense to go back to the bus, so I just people watched and warmed up. At this point, I hadn’t spoken a word to a single person. I thought I might make some conversation, but I didn’t see an opportunity, and I was getting cold. I bought a blanket a goodwill, but I forgot it. My feet were getting numb which was a big concern of mine. There was a gas station that people were just standing in, so I sought refuge there. It was warm, so I stood in there until it was time to line up.

 

Start

The start had self seeded corrals. I hoped to run under 4:00, but I started at the front of the 4 hour corral, rather than the back of the 3.5 hour. I think the marathon started exactly on-time. It took about 5 minutes for my wave to begin. By the time we started, my feet were completely numb. My feet felt terrible. I was really worried. (I have Raynards, which is a disorder that make your hands and feet weirdly colder than the average person.) My feet took a pretty long time to warm up…maybe 5 miles, but eventually they felt like feet.

 

Nutrition plan

Marathons can be made and broken with nutrition. I had a plan to

·         take a gel every 4 miles with water

·         take a salt tablet every hour with water

·         drink nuun at every aid station that I wasn’t taking a gel or salt

I almost always fall off the wagon with my nutrition. I miss something, or I just don’t want to have another gel, and I don’t take it. This time I was on the money for every single step. I train with boom gels, but my pockets were too overloaded, so I decided to take two of the gu on the course. For the record, the course gu was absolutely disgusting. I don’t know how people consume that stuff on the regular. My nutrition was on point, but it was a struggle to maintain. For me to take a pill, I have to come to a complete stop. Hundreds of people just pass you buy as you take a pill or drink, but I knew it was for the best. I really fought to suppress the bad feelings about stopping. Speaking of stopping, I had ANOTHER potty break at maybe mile 8sh. I was a angry at the situation, but after, I felt liberated and ready to crush it.

 

Weather

The weather was on the brisk side for me, but pretty perfect for running. I ran with gloves for about ten mile. When I ditched the gloves. I immediately regretted it. My hands turned to icicles. I’m embarrassed to say that I picked up a random glove off the ground and put it on my hand. My one hand was a slightly warmer icicle for the rest of the race.

 

The Run

I was a beast for 20 miles. I ran by power. My goal was 200W. I ran at about 205 to make up for all the stops. I felt great until about mile 20. You know how it is. At mile 20, I started to question my sanity and swear I’d never to run another marathon. My right knee began to hurt, but no feeling was overwhelmingly bad. I did not hit a wall, but I really wanted to stop running. The last five miles seemed like ten.

 

Pace

Throughout the entire marathon, I had no idea of my pace. My foot pod is way off with the pace, but I turned off the GPS to conserve the battery. I thought I had a data screen that would tell me total elapsed time, but I didn’t . I had no idea how much time was passing or what my pace really was. All I knew was my power number.

 

Finish

I slowed down a little bit in the last 10K, but not too much. My finish time was 3:37:03. That is a -18 minute BQ for me. I was pleased, but the minute I stopped running, my knee started screaming with pain. My knee only hurt a little bit while I was running, but after it seemed unbearable. My kids finally found me, but we were separated by barricades. As I was talking to them, I started to have an asthma attack. My inhaler was in my bag, but the kid with the bag had been conscripted into taking pictures of a random couple. I finally got the inhaler, and it worked immediately. I hobbled my way to the med tent, but they turned me away to the ice area. There were plenty of bags of ice but no way at all to wrap it. The med tent and the ice were in the athletes only section. When I finally connected with my family, I was freezing, my knee was swollen like a melon, and I was in a lot of pain. The throng of people was giving me anxiety. I just wanted out, but there seemed to be only a couple of routes in and out of the cage we were in. We initially went the wrong way and were turned around by the police. It was a long, slow, cold walk to the car, but not completely miserable. Once I was out of the crowd, I felt much better. My kids and my husband were so proud of me and they kept telling me different reasons that they were so impressed with my performance, and, of course, the boys were doing stupid things that made me laugh.

 

Overall

CIM is organized like a well-oiled machine. The elevation profile looks easier than it is in real life. There are rolling hills throughout. The course is not scenic at all, but not actually ugly. Crowd support is sporadic, but enough to keep you going. The shirt is awesome. I would do this race again any time.