My First Full Marathon

After running for 5 years, I finally completed a Full Marathon in Perlis Marathon.  I signed up for Full Marathon after several "encouragement" from the running peers and thought I should had more time to train now after I didn't engage with a full time job for now.

However, my running mood was very down that I practically stop running except for weekend 10km run for the last few weeks before the FM...

Since this is my 1st FM, my aim is just to experience the long distant and complete the race before the cut-off time.  So, I started the run with "slow" pace of around 8min/km.  To avoid muscle cramp, which I heard often from other running friends, I took 100+ in every water stations.  Everything progress as plan.  When I reached 22km check marker, I was very happy because that was the longest distant that I had ever run.  I felt excited to start a new journey.  My goal after this point is just to run as far as I could and start my run-walk plan!

Very soon at 25km, I started to experience pain at the ball of my foot.  I carried on for awhile (a few tens of meters) and I just decided to walk.  From my calculation, if I started the walk at this point, I still would be able to complete before the cut-off time.  I just counting down the remaining distance for the completion...

A few kilometer later, the pain propagated to the heel of my foot even thou I was just walking.  Very soon, I started to feel the pain coming from my thigh muscles of my left leg.  I had to keep walking with fast pace (~10min/km) in order to finish the Full Marathon distant before the cut-off time.  Thus, I just keep the fast walking pace with pain as I believe the permanent injury due to fast walk is not high.  Later part of the walking, the pain propagate to side of my foot and then top of my foot.

At around 30 km of the race, I also felt strain in my abdomen muscles.  I tried to jog slowly, but my pain in my foot was very intense.  I thought to myself that I just have to walk to avoid further injury.

At 40 km, I was thinking to complete the race with 2km jog but then I was just couldn't, the pain at my foot was so intolerable.  Anyhow, I force myself to jog the last 500 m just to look nice at the finish line!

Luckily, with the help of energy gel, I didn't feel that so called "hit-the-wall" symptom.  But really feel like to give up especially the last few kilometers!

Beside completing my first full marathon, I also logged the longest weekly distance of all time at 48.8 km!

Overall, I am very happy with the run although I feel terrible.  I managed to know my weakness to work on for the next Full Marathon.  I think I would not join another Full Marathon without a proper preparation.

I need to work on the core and a longer distant run during training.

Feeling Down

For the month of Feb, I managed to log at least 30 km per week for 3 weeks (44 km in one of the weeks) and with ~23 km in the last week.  Again, I managed to repeat that in March with at least 30 km/week for 3 weeks (with 42 km max) and 25 km in the 4th week.  Unfortunately, April is really a pull back.  For the last 2 weeks, I really didn't feel like running and even suspecting myself of having heart problem.  I took a real rest for the next 3 weeks with only one run per week with ~10 km run.  Only after resting for 3 weeks, I started to check out the so-called heart problem to understand that the pain in my chest is not really related to heart.  After checking, it is likely that I had a strain in chest muscles.

Finally, I started to feel like running again... and looking forward for my first Full Marathon in the coming weekend.

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Extraction from Dr. Thomas Graboys articles.

Understanding Chest Pain
Characteristics	Cardiac Chest Pain	Other Chest Pain
Time of day when pain often occurs	Morning	End of the day
How it usually feels	Pressure, heaviness, constriction, burning, or squeezing. Feels “deep” rather than superficial. Often very hard to describe. Diffuse. May be in the chest. May also radiate to throat, jaw, or even arms and back. Can’t really be “pointed to”/	Feels like real pain, often sharp. Usually more local. May actually be at one point. Usually easy to point to location of pain.
What brings it on?	Pain is usually preceded by exertion, especially upper arm movements like carrying a briefcase, shoveling snow, or carrying bundles. Exertion during exposure to temperature extremes is common provocation. Sometimes follows a heavy meal, especially with exertion. May wake you from sleep.	Usually occurs “out of the blue”. “Heart burn” may come after eating, especially fried foods.
Duration of pain	Usually lasts as long as exertion, but rapidly declines when you stop or reduce exertion.	May come and go very quickly, fleeting, just a few seconds. Or it may last several hours
What relieves it	Stopping exertion. With angina (“aching” from the heart), lying down makes it worse. Sitting and “leaning into” the discomfort helps. SEEK MEDICAL ADVICE – TREATMENT IS MANDATORY!	Exertion or exercise may actually stop this pain. Also: Breathing exercises. Simple analgesics: aspirin, ibuprofen (e.g. Advil), or acetaminophen (e.g. Tylenol). Application of local heat (wet or dry). Antacids (e.g. Tums, Rolaids). Simple reassurance that pain is not from the heart can be very effective.

1st Event in 2017

Gelugor Power Run 2 is the 1st running event in 2017.  Despite accumulating 30km this week, I think I did good in the run clocking 5:40"/km with 3 minor uphill.  I am attributing this to more regular training recently.  Although not long, but I had a more consistent run of 3~4 km every 2 or 3 days.

Except for the beginning 1st km and uphill at 9th km where I ran more than 6 mins pace, my pace was around 5+ min/km throughout the run with only 5:00/km in the last km.

If I can keep to this training schedule and stamina, I will try for another sub-2 HM again end of the year.

Hitting 40km per week mileage

With the help of running group as well as a few holidays, I finally accumulated 40km/week of mileage for the 1st time.  However, the increase in mileage is not gradual which prone to injury.  Joining this running group, the pace is around 7~8min/km (comparing to ~6+min/km that I usually did) because of a few ultra runners in the group.

I have been controlling myself for not following the mileage of other runners.

The day before the last 8km run, the muscle of both of my legs a giving me strange feeling on and off.  So, I will just off for the next 5 or 6 days and hope for the best.