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.