For the 2009 Adelaide marathon I had my most disorganised preparation of any of the 8 marathons that I have run. Given that I got married on 8th August and only arrived back from our honeymoon on the 22 August I think you can see why.
My main focus for 2009 has been my ultras, which in itself has seen me lose quite a bit of speed, but couple that with very little running in the preceding 3 weeks and it didn't forecast any great predictions for a good marathon time.
For the first time ever I didn't have any race plan at all other than to get to the end. I am certain that prior to the start I had almost resigned to the fact that I'd run a personal worst. This didn't bother me one bit as I was just happy to be running the marathon.
We lined up for the start, the gun went off signalling the start and I pretty much just aimlessly set one foot in front of the other. I must say that it's actually quite refreshing not having any goals at all.
The k's were ticking by quite nicely and I was comfortably running 5min/kms. I had an unplanned toilet break but other than that I felt great.
I soon however noticed something that was quite foreign to me and that was a general soreness developing in the legs after around 23km. It was the kind of soreness that I usually get in the very late stages of the marathon. The soreness really got to me and soon I seemed to be just ambling along at what didn't appear to be any great speed at all. It didn't phase me though as I wasn't running to any schedule at all. More than anything it was just annoying.
The k's ticked by at regular intervals and soon we were well into the River Torrens section of the marathon course. Here I experienced something else that was foreign to me. Usually on the marathon I can coast effortlessly down the undulations of the Torrens, but I was actually so sore that I was gingerly running the downward slopes. It was quite clear that my complete lack of long k's on hard roads, combined with a pretty much blown out pair of road shoes was really pounding my body quite badly. Usually I have a nice and freshly broken in pair of road shoes for the marathon, but this time I was really caught out with having to run in an old pair of shoes.
My progress really slowed and I could soon see that I was going to run a personal worst time. Normally this would bother me but this time I didn't care at all. I was just happy to be out running a marathon.
Eventually I arrived at Santos in a time of 3:49:24. This was some 30 minutes slower than last years time where I set a personal best! Things can surely change in the space of 12 months!
Given that I had a disorganised preparation for this marathon, and my focus on other goals this year, I was quite happy with a solid finish. The worst thing about this marathon is that in the days after the race I suffered from soreness far worse than I have ever experienced before, even after my North Face 100 race!
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