Race Recap: Tobacco Road Half Marathon

This winter and spring, my training is focused on the half-ironman I signed up for in June. But I also need to get my running back up to speed as I recover from my hamstring injury that happened in February of 2015. 13 months later, I'm finally showing some signs of a full recovery, but I still haven't gotten anywhere close to where I was before the injury.

Back then, running a 5K slower than 19 minutes was a really bad day. A decent half-marathon (had I run one) probably would have been around 1:30. Now I've had to adjust my goals. One reason I chose to run a half-ironman is that I knew I wouldn't be running very fast in the half. But I still figured something like a 1:38 might be possible—that's about a 7:30/mile pace. A 7:30 pace shouldn't tax my hamstrings, which tend to react most violently to speed workouts.

So for Tobacco Road my goal was to see what kind of a half I was capable of without swimming 1.2 miles and cycling 56 miles beforehand. Then the idea would be to improve my endurance over the next three months so that I could run that same pace as the final leg of a triathlon.

The plan was to run an easy first mile, then run at a 7:30 pace as long as I could hold on. Ideally I'd finish in 1:38 or 1:39. If I found the 7:30s too tough, then my B goal was to hang on for an overall average pace of 8:00 per mile, a 1:45 total time for the half.

I had signed up for Tobacco Road last year, where I was planning to pace my online friend Carrie Endara as she tried for a PR. But the injury in February cancelled that plan, so I had to wait until this year to finally meet Carrie in person. This year she'd be doing the full, so I wouldn't have a chance to run with her (and even if she was running the half, I'd have no shot at keeping up with her!), but I was excited to finally meet her! We had dinner (along with 8 of my DART buddies) the night before the race at a local Italian place and she was just as charming and excited about running as she has been for the several years I have known her online!

Then Chad, Chas, and I drove back to our hotel, where we obsessively organized our gear and slept restlessly before the race. We got up at 5:45 (after adjusting for Daylight Saving Time), and Chas snapped this photo of me in my running gear:

Ready as I'll ever be!

Carrie lives just a half mile from the start, so she invited me and my local running buddies to park at her place and walk together to the race. We all bantered about our goals and plans for the day. It was going to be warm and humid, so some of us (like Carrie) smartly adjusted our goals, while others (like me) foolishly decided to gut it out according to our original plans. Everyone checked their gear before realizing we had never taken a group photo. Hence there is no group photo of everyone before the race. Oh well. It was time to line up for the porta-potties, so I headed over and began my wait.

I managed to find the slowest line, but was able to do my business with about 15 minutes to spare, just in time to eat a GU and head to the starting area. There I found Chad, lined up about even with the 4:15 marathon pace group. I felt like I should be farther forward, but there were crowds ahead of us, and I had wanted to take it easy for the first mile, so I stayed there.

The race started right on time, and we walked slowly towards the line. We finally started running as we crossed, about 1:30 after the gun sounded. The pace felt slow, so I dodged my way forward. I was wasting energy, but I didn't want to run too slow, and I knew we'd be on a greenway after 2.5 miles, and it would be even tougher to pass folks.

I completed the first (uphill) mile in 8:06, so not too fast, although with all the dodging back and forth, my effort was probably too hard for what was supposed to be a warm-up. Mile 2 opened up and I was able to ease into race pace, running a 7:34. A half mile later the half marathon split from the marathon and entered the packed gravel greenway we'd be running on for the next 8 miles. My running buddy Megan was there cheering and taking photos of all the DARTers (not coincidentally, her husband Derek was among them, trying to BQ). I raised my arms and shouted to her, but she told me later that the photo didn't come out. This lack of decent photography would become a theme for the day...

The next few miles felt fairly comfortable, 7:36, 7:28, 7:40, and I settled in behind a couple guys who seemed quite chatty for running a race. Perhaps not surprisingly, after Mile 5 one of the guys told his buddy he needed to walk, and I never saw them again. Not long after that I saw the race leader heading back the other way, looking very strong. He'd go on to win in 1:09:23. Smoking!

Mile 6 was uphill and I slowed to a 7:57. That's okay, I figured, I'd get that as a downhill soon enough. Along here I saw Chas headed home and went for the high-five. We almost missed, but it doesn't count as a whiff if you contact a couple fingers, right? Rather than a high-five it was more like a mid-two. Chas would go on to PR in the race with a blazing 1:25:50. Awesome in these conditions!

Now the volume of runners headed the other way increased and it was tough to spot friends. I missed Allison headed toward a very solid 1:43. After the turnaround I missed Allyson, Pamela, Jack, and may have just seen Barrie out of the corner of my eye.

Now the heat of the day was starting to get to me. It seemed that at every water stop, the cup I grabbed had only an inch or so of water, so I tried to grab as many as I could. Usually I got two, but once I think I managed three. I didn't want to seem like a hog, but it was hot! I'd drink the first cup, take a sip out of the second, then dump the rest over my head. Despite my efforts, my pace slowed. Miles 6-8 were 7:57, 7:59, 7:57.

Then we hit the long gradual uphill I'd been warned about. I knew it was somewhere between Mile 8 and 10 but I kicked myself for not memorizing the exact location of the hill's start and finish (for future reference it starts at 8.2 and continues all the way to Mile 10. Even then, although it levels off somewhat, you don't get a real downhill until 11.8). Over that 1.8 miles you gain just over 100 feet, so it's not steep at all, but there is absolutely no relief. My pace slowed to 8:14 in Mile 9, and 8:27 in Mile 10. Somewhere along here the 1:45 pace team passed me and I wondered if I'd have to kiss my "B" goal of finishing in 1:45 goodbye. But then I remembered that I had started a ways back from the pace team, so I might still have a shot at 1:45! I decided to let myself walk through the aid station at Mile 10, then push hard to the finish.

I was ready for the downhill finish to start when I hit the pavement at Mile 10.6, but alas, the road was still pretty much flat. I did my best to pick up the pace but ended up with an 8:46 for the mile. In Miles 12 and 13, when there finally was some downhill, I was just cooked, and could never go faster than an 8:00 pace. I didn't even manage to speed up for the final sprint to the finish. My finishing splits were 8:07, 8:13, and 8:19 for the final 0.1 miles.

Tough race! My overall time was 1:45:19, an 8:01 per mile average. I'm going to give myself a little slack for the warm conditions and call it "B-goal achieved."

I headed up to the cool-down area and scarfed down two pieces of pizza. Then I met up with Chas, who was very psyched about his PR, and we changed and walked to the finish line to watch the marathon finish. It proved to be an even tougher day for most of the marathoners as the heat got to them. Carrie was the one exception: She finished in 3:11 to capture 5th overall female and first in age group. Here she is running strong to the finish:

Solid!

Then after watching most of my friends finish disappointed, we headed up to the beer tent to drown our sorrows. A small group of us realized that we had never taken a group photo, so the few of us that remained finally managed to get a photo:

Happy Chas, sad Derek, laid-back Chad, okay Dave, and resigned Matt

Chas, Chad and I had a fun lunch with an ecstatic Carrie and three of her cheerful kids before steeling ourselves for the 2.5-hour-drive home. It was only on the ride home that I realized I'd never gotten a photo of my first in-person meeting with Carrie, who's been my online buddy for years. We're going to try to rectify that next week, when we're hoping to get together for a recovery run when she's visiting my part of the state.

Details of yesterday's race are below.

Training and sickness

I have been building up base mileage for the past two months getting ready to start seriously training for my first half-ironman. In two and a half weeks, I'll be running my first tune-up race, the Tobacco Road Half Marathon. Since it is just a tune-up, I am not changing my workout plan much to accommodate it. Still, I need to have some sense of what pace I'm capable of, so this week and next week I have planned a couple of workouts that should help me assess my fitness: Today, I have 6 * 800 on the schedule, and next Tuesday I've got a 4-mile tempo run.

The only problem is, I'm sick with a cold. I did run yesterday, but I came home with my nose running like a faucet. I got worse all day yesterday, and slept fitfully. I pulled the plug on today's workout before I went to bed. I'm starting to feel better now and will probably be in good enough shape for an easy run tomorrow, but not the 2500-meter swim I had planned. This was supposed to be a pickup week after I cut back last week, but that plan is shot to hell.

So what to do about the workouts? I had planned a double on Thursday, with a morning easy run and an evening trail run followed by beer with the running club, one of my favorite events of the week. I think now I will try to slot in that 6 * 800 in the morning and suck it up and miss the beer run that night. Argh. Then I'll do my swim on Friday before resuming something more like my normal schedule on Saturday. I won't get near the amount of mileage I had planned for the week, but hopefully I'll emerge healthy and ready for the following week.

Oh, and did I mention that I'm signed up for a half-ironman in June? It will be my first, the Eagleman 70.3 in Cambridge, Maryland. Somehow I became obsessed with the idea of completing one while I was in India, and then somehow I signed up for one... and then I signed up for another one, the Augusta 70.3 in September. I figure after these two events I will be ready to go all-in on triathlons or give them up completely. Either way, it should be an interesting ride!

First, though, I just need to get over this cold....

Race Recap: Bengaluru Marathon

At 9 pm in my hotel room last night it hit me: I would be running a marathon in the morning, and I'd need a fair bit of water for pre-race hydration.

In India, you can't drink the tapwater. The hotel had provided a small bottle of water for the room, but that was it. I wanted at least a couple liters! So I had to get off of my comfy bed and trudge outside the hotel to find a vendor willing to sell me a large bottle of water. 10 minutes later, that problem was solved, but it's the sort of problem I've never faced before a race. If you need water, you just get it out of the tap.

It was one of many details that make running a marathon in India a somewhat-different experience from the US. Even negotiating my way to the marathon expo to pick up my race bib and shirt was an adventure. I had to find an auto-rickshaw driver who just wanted to get his cab fare (most drivers seem to want to give you a "free" ride to their favorite shopping places instead of the place you actually need to go). Then I had to explain where he was going. He had never heard of the Koramangala Indoor stadium, where the expo was located. I found it on Google Maps, but he didn't want to look at the map; he needed a nearby landmark. Fortunately he knew the Koramangala Police Station (I didn't ask why), so we were off. The expo itself was smallish, but familiar to a runner -- you have to go all the way to the back past the booths in order to get your race packet. I didn't see any booths selling anything I needed, so I just took a quick selfie and went back out to find the same auto-rickshaw driver, who again needed me to explain how to get to my hotel (he had picked me up at a Starbucks a mile or so away).

Ready to go!

Finding a carb-laden dinner that wasn't likely to lead to an upset stomach was also a challenge. Fortunately the regional specialty, biryani, is relatively mild and full of rice (though I couldn't resist ordering some tandoori shrimp as well).

Yum!

The stadium where the race started was right across the street from my hotel, so I walked over to check out the start / finish line.

Pretty cool!

The large stadium is used primarily for soccer and track meets

Here's how close I was to the stadium: I could literally see it from my (dirty) hotel room window:

The room was clean on the inside, honest!

After I got my water, all that was left was to channel-surf for a few minutes to watch some Bollywood-style music videos, and then try and get a little sleep. The race started at the unbelievably early hour of 4:40 a.m. (I think this was mainly an accommodation for traffic), so I set my alarm as early as I could fathom: 3:30.

Naturally I awoke at 3:20. After a quick shower, I changed into my running gear and headed over to the stadium. It was a pleasant 68-degree morning, very comfortable for strolling around, but about 20 to 30 degrees warmer than what I'd prefer for a marathon. However, I'd been training in warmer temperatures for the past 6 weeks so I felt like I should be able to do okay in these temps.

About 10 minutes before the start, we all lined up. There looked to be about 1,500 runners (the much-larger half marathon, thankfully, didn't start for another hour). Soon we were running in the darkness through what looked to be a very nice park. The course was basically an out-and-back, so I took note of the tree cover, which would provide welcome shade during the return trip.

My plan was to run around a 5:40/k pace (9:09/mile) for the first half, which had more downhill than uphill, and then see if I could hang on to the same pace for the return trip and finish under 4 hours. If I wasn't feeling it, I could slow to a 6:00 pace and still finish at around 4:07.

There was a 4-hour pace group, and they seemed to have a similar strategy, going out a little fast (probably more like 5:30/k) to bank some time for the uphill-heavy return. The 5:40-ish pace seemed comfortable, and I even let it drift to around 5:30 on downhill sections. I took care to get plenty of water at aid stations, which were liberally placed every 1-2k on the course. I also dumped some water over my head to cool off. Even though I didn't feel particularly hot, it was always a welcome sensation!

I was keeping the 4:00 pace group in sight, which was nice, except they tended to mob the aid stations so it was sometimes difficult for me to get a cup of water. Even with these delays my pace remained around 5:30-5:40 all the way through 20k (21k is halfway). At some point I saw the leaders headed back on the return of the out-and-back. Even in India it looked like one of the runners was an East African, but the others were all Indian.

I had been concerned about traffic during the race since I'd heard that last year's race was overrun with traffic, but this year the police and volunteers were doing a pretty good job keeping cars off the race route. Typically we had half of a divided four-lane road to ourselves. However, as I approached the turnaround at 22k (it's not a perfect out-and-back), some drivers started becoming a bit more aggressive and impinged on the course. That, plus an uphill approach to the turnaround were slowing me down. I had noted that I passed the 21k marker at around 1:58:00, which meant I had an extra four minutes on the return trip. A quick calculation suggested that if I could keep my pace under 5:50 I should be able to sneak in under four hours.

But right about the point I turned around, now headed downhill, suddenly everything seemed much more difficult. Within a couple kilometers I was starting to think about 6:30 splits instead of 5:50 splits. By 28k, with 14k to go, 7:00 splits were becoming difficult. By 30k my splits were closer to 7:30.

I managed to hang on to that pace until I hit the hill I was dreading -- a long, steady climb from roughly the 33k mark to the 35k mark. My GPS records this as only a 30-foot hill, but it definitely felt much worse. It was also exposed in the sunlight. I took my first extended walk-break, and paid the price. My splits for kilometer 33 and 34 were 11:07 and 9:11. Yikes!

When I reached the top I was able to pick up the pace, barely, even hitting another 7:30 for kilometer 37. Now there was quite a bit of traffic impinging on the road and we were relegated to either running in the dusty shoulder or a rough "sidewalk". I chose the shoulder. I kept it up for a while but took another extended walk break with 5k to go. We were now in the shady park, so I felt relatively cool, I just couldn't convince my body to move any faster. I passed Ram, one of my friends from the Chennai runners, who was run-walking the half-marathon, and he cheered me up briefly. But with about 4.5k to go I was still walking. A Western runner passed me (I think he was just going for a run, not racing) and said "c'mon, it's just 4k to go...really?" It was 4.5k, but of course he was right. I did manage to start moving a bit faster, but not fast enough to stave off the 4:30 pace team.

Finally with just over 1k to go the 4:45 pacer ran by, solo. I asked if he was still on pace and he said he might be a minute slow. I decided to try to keep up. It was definitely tough, but it was doable. I think he even picked up the pace, but I stayed with him. There were signs for 500 meters left, 300, 200...and then we were running into the stadium. The pacer backed off to let me have my moment on the finish line, but I said I wanted to run across with him, so he grabbed my hand and we crossed together. My Garmin recorded the time as 4:43:47. It wasn't sub-4 or even sub-4:30, but it felt great to be done.

At the finish line I met up with Ajit, my contact for the Hyderabad Runners, who had completed the half-marathon and looked much better than I'm sure I did. I gulped down as much water as I could, got my medal, and then watched the finish-area festivities. There was some great funky Indian pop music playing, and lots of runners were up by the stage dancing their hearts out. I could barely move my legs, so unfortunately there was no chance of my joining them. It was also now 10 am and the sun was blazing down on my bare shoulders. I decided to head back to the hotel. I shuffled my way there, showered, and then thought about my post-race meal.

Normally after a big race I eat the biggest hamburger I can find. In India, that's not really an option given that the vast majority of people believe cows are sacred. I decided that I could substitute some good old-fashioned American fried chicken -- at KFC. Unlike in America, to get there I had to haggle with a rickshaw driver over price and convince him I really was in no condition to go shopping, but the chicken at KFC was just as I remembered it. Then I went to Starbucks and had a huge iced-coffee and a slab of cherry chocolate cake. Almost like home!

Unfortunately given my distress during and after the race, I don't have any photos to share of the actual event. But if you're interested, you can check out the details of my race below.

Starting to think about race day

The Bengaluru Marathon is now just five days away. I've been in India for nearly seven weeks and training has gone okay, so I should be ready to race.

That said, I'm still recovering from injury. I've never gone into a marathon with my fitness level so low, so setting goals for myself has been difficult. I've always felt that even when running a marathon "for fun," I should be able to complete a road marathon in under four hours, but as I think about this event, I'm not quite sure that is a reasonable goal.

A 4-hour marathon requires a 9:09 pace per mile, or 5:40 per kilometer. Most of my training runs -- even the short ones -- have been slower than that. In principle, there's nothing wrong with taking your training runs slowly. Often runners say they have difficulty keeping their pace slow enough compared to what their training plan proscribes. In my case, it's been so hot and humid that I've had little trouble keeping my runs slow. My difficulty has been in getting enough mileage. Since I'm recovering from injury, I don't want to push the mileage too far, but I still want to be prepared for the race.

When I'm healthy I like to peak at 70 miles per week during marathon training. I haven't gotten anywhere close to that training for Bengaluru. The past 6 weeks have looked like this: 43 miles, 40, 31, 40, 36, and 29 (the last two weeks are taper weeks). Again, plenty of people run marathons on mileage like that, but I'm not sure how many of them are breaking 4 hours.

Where I've been lacking is speed work (I've done practically none for fear of injury) and long runs (my longest is 28k [17.5 miles]; I would have preferred to run a couple 32k [20-mile] runs). How will I perform in the final, uncharted 14k of this race? I don't know.

The final variable is temperature. It should be considerably cooler in Bangalore than it has been during many of my training runs. Here's the current forecast for race morning:

Race starts at 5:30 a.m. and ideally I'd finish by 9:30

Even by the end of the race, it should be cooler than nearly all of my runs here, but it's still considerably warmer than what I'd like to see--my ideal running temperature is around 40 degrees! I know the weather will be slowing me by the end of the race. The question is, should I try to bank a little time at the start when temperatures will be cooler? Another argument in favor of a faster start is the elevation profile:

Elevation is in meters!

It's not a super hilly race but there is definitely some climbing, and most of that climbing happens towards the end of the race.

My solid "B" goal for the race is to run 6:00 per kilometer, about 9:40 per mile. This would have me finishing in 4:13. To hit my "A" goal of sub-4-hours, I need to run 5:40/k or 9:09/mile. I think a reasonable approach to that goal is to shoot for sub-5:40 pace on the downhills at the start, running closer to a 6:00 for the uphills. Then if I'm feeling good after the turnaround 22k in (13.7 miles), I can try to stay below 5:40 even on the climbs. If I can push through the big climb around 33k at that pace, then I will have a shot at sub-4; if not, hopefully I can at least hang on for 4:13.

I read an interesting article yesterday about running in the heat. The take-home message is that runners perform better in the heat if they pre-cool. In 65-degree temps this probably just means not bundling up before the start, bringing some cold water to consume at the start, and also probably taking every opportunity to dump cold water over my head during the race, even before I feel hot.

The article also offers some advice for heavy sweaters like me, and offers a strategy for hyper-hydration before a race. Since I haven't had time to test this out, I'm not going to try this during the race, but it's an interesting strategy that I may try some time in the future.

During today's run it was relatively cool (around 70 degrees) and I was feeling good, so I allowed myself a few kilometers at sub-5:00 pace (it ended up around 7:50/mile). It felt fairly solid; my hamstrings seemed none the worse for the wear, so I think I should be okay running anything up to about a 5:00 pace during the race on downhills. Anything faster than that would probably stress my legs too much, but even a 5:00 pace will allow me to bank some time.

When I was initially thinking about running a race in India, I was concerned about the quality of water provided to the runners, but since I've gotten here I've been fine drinking water provided by restaurants, etc. Everyone knows that you can't drink tap water, so what's provided at the race should be fine. Therefore I'm not going to use the hydration pack I brought for the race; I'll use the regular aid stations like everyone else. That should save me some weight and allow me to go a little faster.

Wish me luck!

Running long and hot in Chennai

It's 4:20 a.m. on Sunday morning.

I'm standing in the darkness on the side of the Grand Southern Trunk Road in Chromepet, south of Chennai, India.

Despite the early hour, there's quite a lot of activity. I've been told to meet here with the Chromepet chapter of the Chennai Running Club for our Sunday long run. Some men have set up an improvised water distribution depot next to the road. The road itself is also quite busy for this time of day, with fully loaded buses, trucks, scooters, and cars whizzing by with dramatic regularity.

Not a great place for a run...

But there are no runners here. There aren't a lot of places to run in Chennai; most of the roads are simply too busy to run on, even early in the morning, so the running club arranges meetups throughout the city, and runners then carpool to the start of their run. My meetup isn't till 4:45, and I've run with the Chromepet guys before, so I'm not especially worried. But last time, they picked me up at Madras Christian College, where I'm staying. This time, the college is out of the way compared to where the run starts, so I had to get myself to the meetup.

This involved setting an alarm for 3:55 a.m., walking the half-mile from the guest house to the college gate, waking up the guard so he could open the gate, then getting opinions from three different auto-rickshaw drivers about how to get to the location I specified. They were quite baffled as to why someone would want a ride to Ambika Wood Industries (the location of our meetup) at 4:10 a.m. During the drive, the driver kept asking if he was going the right way, despite the fact that I had already told him it was right on the main road. Finally he would go no further, saying we were at the edge of Chromepet. I could see from the map on my phone that the location was close, so I paid him and walked the rest of the way there. Ambika Wood Industries is indeed closed at this hour.

At 4:30 I text Ramachandran to make sure I'm at the right spot. He replies right away saying I am and he'll be there in 10 minutes. At 4:55 I text again to see if he's still on the way. He say's yes, sorry, he'll be there in 5 minutes. Finally at 5 a.m. the runners show up and we head south towards the Officers' Training Academy where we'll be running. Immediately, amazingly to me, we run into a traffic jam:

Yep, this is 5:07 on a Sunday morning.

Finally, we arrive. The place where we're running turns out to be more than just an academy, it's a military complex with a naval air station, a coast guard air station, and also a shrine to St. Thomas (who, legend has it, was martyred at this spot). We will be running on the access roads connecting all these places. Even at 5:20, in the darkness, I can see that lots of people have figured out this is a good place to exercise. There are walkers, runners, and a few cyclists, though there are only about 4k worth of runnable roads that aren't behind security checkpoints. We'll be doing a double-out-and-back to make a 6k loop. My plan is to run 32k, or 20 miles, my one 20-miler of this marathon training cycle (my marathon, Bangalore, is just 3 weeks away).

Ramachandran (who goes by "Ram") had told me that several runners would be doing 28k, so I figured I'd have company for most of my run. As it turned out, they had changed this plan, doing their 32k run last week and taking it easy this week because they are running a half-marathon two weeks out(!) from the Bangalore Marathon.

Two runners accompany me for the first loop, sprinting to the top of the hill where St. Thomas is buried. I plug along at a more methodical pace of 6:30/k, about 10:30 per mile, which seems reasonable in the 81-degree, 100% humidity morning. Another group of runners is doing repeats on the hill, and there also seems to be a school track team or club working out here.

After lap 1, 6k in, I feel like this might be doable. I'm wearing a hydration pack and taking frequent sips, and I have a plan to eat a gel every 7k. There is a security station at the end of the first out-and-back, 2k into the loop, and the guards stand and salute as I pass.

The route is flat except for the one big hill where the St. Thomas Shrine sits. I take a blurry selfie on the flat part:

So far, so good!

Up to now I've been keeping quite close to my planned 6:30 pace, but I can feel the day start to warm up as the sun rises in the eastern sky. Still, I maintain my 6:30 pace, even up the 140-foot climb of St. Thomas Mount.

Back at the cars, it looks like some of the other runners are already wrapping things up, and I still have 20k to go. I turn and head out for another loop. I figure out that I'll need to do a total of 5 loops plus an additional 2k to get to 32. I'm starting to recognize familiar faces among the walkers, runners, and cyclists on my route. I wave at the saluting guards again. Climbing the hill again, I find myself unable to maintain that 6:30 pace. I slow to 6:58, then 7:05. At the bottom of the hill, I pick it up a bit, but only to 6:45. This is going to be a long day.

18k done, back at the cars, I begin to wonder whether I can do this. The other runners all seem to be done, and it seems unfair to ask them to wait for me. I head out for another loop, with a new goal of just keeping the pace faster than 7:00 per mile. This works until I get to the hill. I tell myself I can walk when I get to the steep part at the top.

Finally I make it back to the cars: 24k done, 8k to go. I'm out of water in my hydration pack, but I have a couple water bottles in my bag, so I refill. I tell Ram that maybe they should just leave without me -- everyone is definitely finished. He tells me they will stay close by and can pick me up when I finish.

The heat is now stifling. Though there are some places with shade, a lot of the route is exposed. I decide I'm definitely not running up the hill again; I can just complete a shorter loop and tack on a little extra at the end.

By the time I reach the security guards 2k into the loop, I decide that I've had enough. I will just head back to the starting area, 28k complete, and call it a day. I've been run-walking for the past few kilometers anyways, and it's not clear I'm really getting any benefit from the workout. My times for the last 4k: 7:52, 7:16, 8:47, 7:45. Average pace for the whole run: 6:51/k, or 11:08 per mile. Here I am at the end of the run, totally spent:

That was hard!

On the drive home, the runners tell me that typically when they train in Chennai and race in cooler climates, their times improve by 20-30 minutes. I hope so! Bangalore is usually 10-15 degrees cooler than Chennai and much less humid, so if I want to be out there less than 5 hours or so, I'll need to go considerably faster than I did today. My goal is to run the race at a 6:00/k pace, which would have me finishing in 4:13. Given my recent struggles with injury and my general pattern of not running well in the heat, I'll take it!

Details of today's run are below:

Running in Tiruchchirappalli

After two weeks in Chennai, India, our group has embarked on a two-week road trip, starting with a train ride to Tiruchchirappalli, also known as "Trichy." But why use a boring 6-letter name when you can use the grand, official, 17-letter name of Tiruchchirappalli? Yep, that's a double-ch you see there. Some people spell it with only a single ch, but I say that's pure laziness, especially given the coolness and oddity of a string of 4 consonants in a row!

One nice thing about Trichy is that it is a touch cooler and considerably less humid than Chennai in the mornings. So after sweating through "feels like" 105-degree runs in 80 degrees and 95 percent humidity, my two runs here have started at around 78 degrees and 70% humidity. Don't get me wrong, this would still be oppressively hot for a summer morning run back home, but it's been a welcome change from Chennai. Even at 9 am this morning as I finished my long run, the temperature was a quite-bearable 84 (feels like 90).

We're staying on a small college campus (Bishop Heber College), which, unlike Madras Christian College, where I stayed in Chennai, only has a half-mile or so of runnable roads. So yesterday I decided to venture outside to the busy city streets. Trichy is perhaps a quarter the size of Chennai, but it still is a bustling city with over 2 million inhabitants, so traffic was a major concern. But I had spotted a river on the map less than a mile away and thought maybe the road next to the river would be relatively quiet. It turned out I was right! After about a kilometer dodging traffic I found myself on a levee next to the river, enjoying minimal traffic. There was even a cute little temple on a rock next to the river:

Nice spot for a temple!

From campus to the end of the levee and back was about 5 miles (8k -- I'm trying to use kilometers here in India since that's how my marathon will be marked). So today for my 28k (17.4-mile) run I decided to do three out-and-backs plus an extra 4k along the levee. My goal pace was about 6:30/k, roughly 10:30 miles. I think in better conditions I'd be considerably faster than that, but given the temperatures, the rough road, and dodging traffic to and from the levee, that would be just fine. The main point is just to get time on my feet in preparation for my marathon in five weeks. I was carrying a 500 ml water bottle and would refill it each time I returned to the college.

I started in the dark at 5:45 a.m. I figured the campus would be well-lit but it turns out I was wrong, so I sort of felt my way to the campus gate in the dark, getting annoying jolts at two speed bumps along the way. Out on the road, I was surprised to see considerable traffic at this hour. Like most major roads I've seen so far in India, this road had a dirt shoulder, but pedestrians typically walk along the pavement, trusting that the scooters, buses, trucks, auto-rickshaws, cars, and oxcarts will move out of their way when they pass. I ran on the pavement on the right (facing the oncoming traffic, which stays to the left in India) but hopped onto the shoulder whenever I passed a pedestrian or when a vehicle seemed to be dangerously close. It was unnerving seeing the scooters' headlights rushing in my direction, but somehow I made it to the levee and could get a little breathing room.

I got to watch the sunrise as I ran along the river, and it really did make for a beautiful scene:

Haven't seen many sunrises like this anywhere in the world!

There was a peacock and several peahens on the trail, and numerous birds were perched on bushes or flapped nearby catching bugs. Some larger waterbirds were in the river, and some people were down in the river doing their laundry.

As I ran along the river I began to get familiar with a few spots along the way. There was the house with the mean dog, the house with the yappy little dog, the church, the little temple on the rock, the larger temple, and even a snack stand. I decided to do the extra 4k along the river on my first out-and-back, figuring I'd be less interested in such nonsense later on. Soon, I was back on the main road dodging traffic and headed towards the college. 12k done, I fueled up, refilled my water, and headed back out. I had kept a solid 6:30/k pace for the first 12k.

Now traffic was really starting to get bad and I found myself slowing considerably as I dodged people and vehicles. Once I had to stop completely to avoid running into a bicycle, who didn't expect to see a runner on the road! Finally I made it back to the levee and my familiar route. This time a group of women was sitting near the snack stand and giggled as I ran by. Some boys were playing by the big temple and also gave me a grin. I even noticed a couple of different men who looked like they, like me, were out on the levee for fitness (though they were walking rather than running). Again I made it to the turnaround and headed back home, but my pace was now a little slower as the day heated up and the traffic became more difficult to dodge. As I ran through the gate of the college, the security guard asked if I was finished. "Nope, I've got one more!" I said. 20k was done, and I refilled one last time before heading back out.

Traffic was even worse this time as folks were crowded around market stalls or at bus stops, but again I made it to the levee without incident. The same group of women was at the snack stand and one of them shouted at me with a smile: "How are you doing? Are you fine?"

"Doing great!" I replied. Actually I was getting worn out. It's been a long time since I have done this kind of distance on a run. I did do one trail run that was longer a few months ago, but that involved just as much hiking as running. The turnaround couldn't come soon enough. Most people seemed to either ignore me or give me a stare that seemed to say "we don't see much of your kind around here," but others were friendlier. One man said "You've run here two times, right?" "Actually, three!" I replied. But my pace was definitely slowing, and it was a struggle to even run 7:00/k, slower than an 11-minute mile!

Finally I was back on the yet-busier main road, less than 2k from home. I was going slower still, but still running unless I had to walk to avoid running into someone or something. I stumbled through the college gate and ran towards the Guest House, just in time to see Greta and her students walking to class. "Go Dave!" they all cheered. Another 100 meters and I was done; my longest steady run since my injury last February.

It was too late for breakfast, so I ate leftover cake from last night's birthday party for one of our students. I'd have to say, it's not a bad recovery meal!

My average pace for the was a plodding 10:55 per mile, or 6:46/k. Hopefully I can be a little faster than that during my actual marathon. It should be considerably cooler, perhaps 70 degrees, so maybe I'll be able to pull out a 6:00/k pace for the race. That would be about a 4:13 marathon...not one of my best efforts, but still in the realm of respectable. Details of today's run are below.

Bengaluru Marathon Route

This is mainly a note to myself: Here is the Bengaluru Marathon route, assuming they don't change the course from last year.

https://connect.garmin.com/activity/619312897

Doesn't look too bad; about 750 feet of vertical gain. Unfortunately where I'm training right now has absolutely no hills, so some of those hills may seem rather daunting on race day.