Seattle Marathon 2008

Okay, I know. I said I would skip Seattle Marathon this year after hurting my (left) knee in Portland Marathon last month.

As my knee recovered slowly, I made a few test runs in my neighborhood to check if I still had pain while running up/down the hills. The cruicial test run of 10mi on Thu (11/28) didn't bother me with knee pain at all. My last minute decision to run Seattle Marathon 2008 was made on Fri night and I registered on-site on Sat.

Because I knew that my knee was not going to be perfect for a full marathon, I decided to run slowly and make sure that I could run through all the way to the finish line without stopping or being lame.

The weather condition was fairly good with temperature around 53~55 although it was foggy and humid (92%) all day. I remember last year's Seattle Marathon when my hands and face were freezing while running half marathon program.

Running across I-90 floating bridge (express lanes) on foot and around water front of Lake Washington was fantastic. Newly equipped Garmin Forerunner 205 worked very well giving me accurate running speed and distance all the time.

I passed half way point (13.1mi) at 2:07:49 at Seward Park loop.

The course seemed relatively flat with slow rolling hills until 20 mi point where one of the two major hills appeared at Madison Street. I ran up all the way without stopping at slow speed for about 1 mi and then a rewarding downhill started to the entrance of University of Washing Arboretum. The last obstacle to clime up the hills in Arboretum provided a big challenge but I passed through without a big trouble.
As I was getting out of Arboretum, I could peek the Space Needle with top portion blocked by low cloud and fog, meaning I had only 3 mi to go.

The rest of the run was slow downhill except an underpass to get into the Memorial Stadium where the finish line was set up. And, here we go, I finished Seattle Marathon 2008 all the way through at 4:35:10.
It was the first time that I finished a full marathon without any issue and especially I am still healthy with no injury.

Next stop? Christmas Marathon in Olympia, WA in 3 weeks.

Portland Marathon 2008

I ran for the 2nd full marathon on early Sun morning in the 37th Portland Marathon in Portland OR.

The race started at 7am, but the group aiming for 4 hours was able to start 3~4 minutes later. The cloudy weather turned into rain from 8am and continued through out the race.

I did pretty well in keeping the pace at 9 min/mile until 11-mi point when I had a sharp pain on the left knee where I already had felt uncomfortable prior to the race. The concern just became reality and bothered me from keeping the pace. So, I had to slow down a little bit to move the runnig balance to the right leg mostly to ease the pain on the left knee.

I passed the half point (13.1 mi) at 2hr 1m 9s wearing the pain on left knee.

However it began to swell and I thought I needed some medical assistance at around 16-mi point. The volunteer who looked at my knee suggested stop running at that point and put the ice pack on the left knee.

I sat on a chair and rested for 5~10 min there and then all of a sudden I felt fairly good and wanted to finish the race.

Yes I had already run for 16 mi and 10.2 more mi would give me another victory. So, I sneaked out of the medical assistance tent with a swollen knee and joined the race.

From that point, the biggest hill of the course started and continued for 3~4 miles, but I felt no problem running the uphill. I passed a lot of people on the hill to reach on top of the bridge keeping the pace between 9:20 and 9:40 per mile.

However, the problem came up on the down hill where I felt a serious pain on the left knee at every single foot step.

I had to stop there and took another break for a few minutes. Unfortunately, the pain didn't go away, and, worst of all, my right leg that took too much burden to keep me moving from 11 mi point provided huge stress on it. I had to walk slowly for the rest of the race (5 mi I guess). Slow walk at 19:00 instead of running at 9:00 added extra 50 min for the rest 5 miles finishing at 4hr 53min 43s finally.

Good news is that I am still alive and the legs are still attached on my body, although left knee looks slightly bigger that the other for now.

I will take some rest, skip the Seattle Marathon next month, and try again for the 3rd full marathon early next year.

Seafair Marathon 2008

My first full marathon. I was one of 400 people who missed the last shuttle to start line, but drove my car for late start. It was a hot day and I had many hills to deal with for a tough first marathon. Good run until 22 mi point and then stop-and-go.


Finish time 4:43:48