I Love LA!

The Expo
I drove to the LA Marathon expo on Saturday morning. I always look forward to attending this expo every year. I parked at my favorite $5 parking lot on Pico and walked over to the Convention Center. It was a madhouse inside. As usual I ended up spending more money than I should have. I bought a Phiten necklace, signed up for the Las Vegas Marathon, and 2 pairs of rainbow Injinji toe socks. I quickly made my way through every aisle in fear that I would make my wallet even lighter.

Pre-race
Race morning, I woke up early to take care of business... eat and poop! They say never to try anything new on race day. But I say who cares when you run so dang slow! I wore my new rainbow socks and my Phiten necklace. The necklace was suppose to help with back pain and I wanted to test it out. I headed on out around 5am and parked at Sierra Madre Metro station to hop on the Gold line. With a quick change over to the Red line at the Union Station, we arrived at Pershing Square in no time.

My friend Billy spots me as I was walking towards the starting area. My bright orange Worldvision shirt comes in handy. He was with his cousin and his friend, Cody. We hit the portopotties where we spotted 2 barefoot runners, Barefoot Bob and Julian Romero. Julian was featured on TV where they took notice that he ran a 2:56:22 sans shoes! I was soon spotted by Roccco when I went looking for water after I bid farewell to Billy, Billy's cousin, and Cody. He said that I stood out like a pumpkin in a sea of bright green, the color of this year's SRLA (students run LA).

I later learned that I had gotten on TV for about 3-4 seconds. If you watch the on-demand video on www.universalsports.com you can see me on the lower right hand side of the TV screen at 38:21 and 38:43. I'm pretty easy to spot.

In the past 5 years, I have done my worst at the LA Marathon because I kept on showing up injured and turning the event into pretty much a walkathon. I wanted to run this race hard but finish feeling strong. I kept in mind that I have San Diego the following week. I knew going into this race that my left Achilles and right hip flexor were going to be issues, but I wanted to see how long I could maintain a 4:00 pace... so I went with the following goals:
A: 4:00
B: 4:30
C: finish

The Race
We were packed like sardines at the starting line. I tried to line up as close to the 4:00 pace group but there was no way I could make my way to them, but I was in the general vicinity. The start was crazy, but people for the most part were moving fast enough for me to have a comfortable stride. Why do walkers insist on being in the front? Soon after mile 1 I was passed by a Luke Walton looking guy wearing a Kobe 24 jersey dribbling a basketball while talking on a cellphone. I was "rear-ended" by some dude on a turn just before the 5mile mark. That was weird. It felt like he just fell on my legs. I must have kicked him up at least twice. He was saying stuff in Spanish to his friends, but everybody seemed ok... so no blood, no harm, no foul.

1: 9:10
2: 8:16
3: 8:30
4-5: 18:00
6: 9:21
10k: 54:55

7: 9:11
8: 9:01
9: 9:13
10: 9:09
11: 9:56
12: 9:16
13: 9:05
13.1mi: 1:59:09

I started falling off the 4:00 pace around the 15th mile. Soon thereafter the pace group quickly devoured/passed me like a fast moving amoeba. The bad patch lasted over 2 miles, but I was able to fire up the engines again and keep the pace group somewhat in sight. But they slowly pulled away from me. Right before mile 19 I spotted Kathy and went over to say hi. She was passing out goodies with her sister and friends. After the potty break, I pretty much knew that goal A was out the window. I had to start taking extended walking breaks. I saw the ultramarathoning phenom Dean Karnazes around mile 22. I said hi to him as he passed me. The freak ran about 100 miles from Santa Barbara to the expo on Sunday to be the featured speaker, and then runs the marathon on Monday! He's going to run down to San Diego and then run San Diego Rock n' Roll Marathon. What a beast! I saw Huskydon at around mile 23. I wasn't moving fast and he looked very familiar so I made my way over to him to get a better look. I was struggling quite a bit with my energy level and the desire to run while I was on Olympic. But once I turned on Flower to head for the finish line, I just turned on the jets and ran a decent hard pace to the finish. It felt great to be able to finish strong instead of crawling across. After getting my medal and eating a couple of bananas, I went over to the finish line where I saw NYCParkrunner (Joe) cross the finish line at a little over 5hrs.

14: 9:04
15: 10:24
16: 10:14
17: 9:46
18: 9:52
19: 9:26
30k: 2:54:05

20: 14:37 (potty break)
21: 11:40
22: 10:53
23: 12:20
24: 12:52
25: 12:08
26: 11:05
26.2: 1:43
Finish: 4:24:24

2004: 7:35:37 all time personal worst
2005: 7:01:34 previous personal course record - not very hard to beat!
2006: 7:05:06
2007: 6:07:08 Universal Studios start
2008: 5:24:25 Universal Studios start

When I got home and watched the on-demand video... at the end of the race coverage, Frank McCourt mentioned that he wants to work on changing the course for next year to show off the defining points of LA. He wants the race to start at Dodger stadium and end at the beach. He feels that that will create an attractive world class race that will bring people from all over the world to run the LA Marathon. I sure hope so, his group pulled it off this year despite all of the hurdles that they had to clear. They were seriously handicapped from the get-go. I will be back next year and I was glad to have gotten the chance to redeem myself on the course that completely owned me 3 years in a row.

What I learned
The Phiten necklace seem to have worked. I didn't have the usual lower back tightness at the beginning of the race. I will have to test it further to rule out coincidence. My legs seem to resist cramping better if I eat the shotbloks first then go to the clifshots afterwards. I did the reverse at PV and I cramped up so bad that I couldn't even walk for a while.