Strike three

In perfect conditions, I completed my eighth marathon distance this morning. It was never going to be one where I was expecting to cover myself in glory; the eleven weeks between the Kirikiriroa Marathon and this one was blighted by a fall, a cold, a niggle and generally lacklustre training. And from my learning from the Kirikiriroa race, I had steeled myself to restrain pace from the beginning. Despite thinking I was doing this, the final quarter rhymed with the previous race: it was a struggle.

The North Shore Marathon route is now equal with Auckland Marathon as the event I have done the most. The Auckland event starts with a bit of undulation through the Shore, a cruise along the motorway to the Bridge, then after the Bridge it is basically flat to St Helliers and back. The North Shore event is simpler: First you start along Milford Beach (beach section 1) then climb onto the road to Takapuna then run the full Takapuna Beach, then you climb out of there to Takapuna Grammar, then drop down to Narrow Neck Beach (fortunately not on the sand), then you climb out of there before dropping onto Cheltenham Beach for an interminable soft sand section, then you are rewarded with a climb up and around Northhead... and then you do it in reverse, and then back, then in reverse. Three beach sections time four, two Northheads. In some ways, it should be the easiest one to pace as you are fully aware of what is in store after you've only done a quarter... yet every time this event gets me. 

My first attempt was in 2018 where I felt well trained and plunged in and started struggling after my second climb of Northhead (about 31km in), and even walked at around the 37km mark, and pulling into finish around 3:44. (My blog of it: Always crashing the same car) 

The next year I wanted to remedy this and ran what is still my best attempt completing the course in 3:32. Cruelly this was not official because the full marathon event was cancelled due to the threat of a weather event. I missed the memo, as did others who turned up early to run. Sixteen of us decided that the weather event wasn't going to materialise and ran it anyway. It went smoothly until about the 37km and I slowed down but was still proud of the effort. (Blog: This is number five and I'm feeling quite alive...)

So, what happened this time? Basically it was a rehash of my first attempt but with a slower pace for the first three-quarters, and never walking from fatigue this time round. One annoying thing was that my watch recorded 20.6km for the first half. This means either it was shorter than a marathon, or my watch hadn't quite tracked it accurately and I was actually running faster than I should have been. 

Will I be back? Almost certainly - their Super Earlybird price is pretty super so it "won't hurt" to join it. And I want to nut it out. But this will probably be my last marathon for 2023. One interesting thing about this year is that I've only done marathons - no halfs, no ten or five kilometre events. Not surprisingly I have not really regained my pace from previous years despite having run high volumes. So I would like to try getting that speed back in the last four months of the year, and I would like to see if I can settle my score with the Omaha Half Marathon in December.