Race Reports

Grandfather Mountain Marathon
July 12, 2008

Well, you might think I was bright enough to pull some important tidbit to help fuel my training for the Grandfather Mountain Marathon (tagline “One of America’s  Toughest Marathons”), but no such luck.  GMM was my fourth race this year and the three before it went quite well – so I was just going to phone it in… 

My previous marathon was in the beginning of May and in the eight weeks before GMM my longest run before taper was 16 miles.  OK, that’s not exactly ideal, but I figured that I maintain a pretty consistent level of fitness so I’d be fine to just push through when it got tough.  And sure, there would be some hills but I regularly hit the trails in Umstead, so some hills wouldn’t be a problem.  As a mid-season race, this one was only meant to be “fun” anyway – so I wasn’t out to PR.  Heck, I felt ready for this – and I was totally wrong.

This is what you’d call a “no frills” kind of race.  No expo, host “hotel” was App State dorms, there was no traffic control along the course – which was pretty hairy running into oncoming traffic on twisty mountain roads with blind corners and no road shoulders.  Can’t say I really appreciated that last item, but it certainly added a unique element of danger to a physically brutal marathon course – nice!

Race morning was reasonable cool (by comparison to Raleigh standards at maybe 60 degF) and sunny.  We started at the App State Track –  and pre race  instruction consisted of a the race director cupping his hands to his mouth (no PA system needed!) and shouting at everyone a caution not to get run over when we hit the hills.  Thanks, I’ll make a note of that…  We lined up at the 400 meter line on the track (no official starting line formalities here).  The starter shouts “Go!” and we’re off.  Like I said – no frills.

Running through App State campus and Boone was wonderfully flat and it was easy to hammer along at normal race pace while running my usual intervals of 4:1’s.  The dream ended pretty quickly when we turned out of town and around the first hills and started our first series of climbs at mile three.  Things changed pretty quickly as it got really steep, my legs got heavy, and my heart rate skyrocketed.  By mile 5 or 6 it was abundantly clear that I’d tragically underestimated the difficulty of this race.  I needed to quit trying to run an even pace and run an even effort across the peaks and valleys.  By the time we got to the half mark, we were pretty much on target to our goal at about 2:14 – but I knew that I was already far more tired than I should be to maintain an even split (and the second half had more climbing!).

The Wall comes at different times for all of us – but usually late in the race – somewhere at 20+ miles.  It’s just that point in time when you could just as easily hop a ride to the finish and willingly accept your first DNF, but you eventually resolve to grind out the last few miles and not give in to the overwhelming temptation to just call it a day.  I vividly recall The Wall coming around mile 16 for me – as we were on a long, grinding climb and we rounded a corner to see nothing but a longer, grinding climb ahead of us for as far as we could see.  This was going to be a looong race for me with *only* 10 more miles to go.  It was also going to require some distinct strategy change – specifically, we walked most of the uphills and mostly stuck to the intervals on the downhills.  This seemed to be the only real strategy for all the middle-of-the-pack group (like me) because there were long lines of people walking up all the hills.  Motorists on the mountain roads weren’t likely aware that this was a race – probably thought it was a walk-a-thon for charity.  To add insult to injury, somewhere around the middle teen miles, I got passed by Coat Man – a theme runner who was wearing a full winter coat, high dark dress socks, and dress shoes - and carrying a serving tray with a bottle of champagne (empty) and two glasses (plastic) affixed to the tray.  He wears long, bright orange streamers (like fringe) affixed to the coat and tray – so he’ll be highly visible to motorists.  Like you could miss this nut job if you tried!  (It would be like trying *not* to look at a car wreck.  Google this guy and you’ll see what I mean…)  Great… Super… Is this some sort of cosmic joke for my lax attitude about training for this race?!  OK, message received!

We just pushed along with our walk uphill/run downhill plan and managed to get to the foot of Grandfather Mountain – where we would soon finish on the track at the Highland Games.  While I’m not a huge fan of the bagpipes, they sure sounded good today.  A short slog through across the filthy fair grounds and you enter onto the track with 15,000 spectators (drunken and in kilts) to cheer you for the last ¼ mile.  All the pain momentarily subsides and I’m a rock star and finish with a kick in 4:39 (well off goal and my worst marathon time in quite a few years).  A final footnote: As I looked at my Garmin, I noticed that the course was short – as my GPS noted only 25.5 miles.  Hey, I wasn’t promised a certified course (no frills!) and I wasn’t dying to run another step – so maybe the vertical distance counted toward the final total of 26.2?

So this may not have been my finest running experience – and I deserved to suffer for being unprepared.  On a positive note, it was quite pretty running along the Blue Ridge Parkway and through the mountain roads.  But, if you got the idea that I was a bit underwhelmed by many aspects of this run, you’d be right.  I’d heartily recommend this race to anyone looking for a real test of your mettle, but warn that you should keep expectations suitably low for most other aspects of the race.

Darryl Banks

10:00 Group/The Incredibles