2008 Shanghai Marathon

Well, it has been a little over a week since the Shanghai Marathon. It turned out to be a beautiful day to run. It was a little chilly, but blue clouds and very sunny. I was very excited and motivated to run. It would be a very packed day with over 13,000 runners for the half marathon and the full marathon. Another 7,000 would run the 4.5 km fun run.

I would say it was a case of all the usual suspects running in the Marathon. Above you can see Team Delphi up bright and early ready for the long run. All of us participated in the Hangzhou Half Marathon and were ready to go three weeks later with our second half marathon in November.

The start of the Shanghai Marathon is something really special. The elite runners are separated from the rest of the field by group of soldiers. When the marathon starts, the elite runners start running along with all the soldiers and the rest of the field. After about one hundred meters, the soldiers pull of the course and the race is on.

Here you can see the group of soldiers that would start the race with us. They would have to run pretty fast with about 13,000 people running behind them. The actual starting lane for all these people is actually quite small for the number of runners starting the race. In Houston, we had one three lane street for just the half marathon runners. In Hangzhou, we also had a three lane street for all the runners. Here it is pretty important to be close to the front. Even though your chip time is recorded, all results are based on your gun time. So if you are close to the two hour cut-off for the extra prize you have five minutes less to finish. Even worse if you are close to the three hour cut-off to be listed as a finisher, you better finish five minutes earlier.

As you can see, a sea of people waiting for the start of the race. There is really no place to stretch or warm up. At least it was nice and warm with all of us so close together. As we got closer to the start of the race, all of us would get excited and compress even closer.

Here I am in the sea of people all smiles and ready to run. The excitement fills the air and you get so pumped to start the race, that you have to remember not to go all out on the first couple of kilometers.

This year my training had been much better than the previous year. I was expecting to be able to run the race under 1:50. I was a little bit nervous because the last two weeks, the training had not been very good. I missed my 14 mile long run and only done 13 miles a week for the last two weeks. Rain showers had messed up my schedule and my longest run after Hangzhou was 9 miles. I was really not to sure how I would do.

The race started and I was feeling pretty good, so I let my own body set the pace and I would just glance down and see how I was at the mile alerts on my Garmin GPS. I was doing excellent. The first eight miles I was running eight minute miles. I was on track to better my Houston Marathon time. On the ninth mile I had began to slow. By the tenth mile I started to feel a slight pain in my left ilio band. This feeling is not a pleasant feeling and I know that in minutes you can go from running to walking. I slowed down the pace and finished the half marathon with a respectable 1:48:47 gun time, 799th place.

I think I really needed those last two weekends of long runs to keep the legs and the ilio band in shape and used to the fatigue. Well, at least I was able to break last years mark by about a full nine minutes.

Last year I received a finisher's certificate and a pair of 95 RMB ($13.87 US) Win-DO running shoes for finishing under two hours. This year, it was a pleasant surprise to receive a finisher's medal as well as the finisher's certificate. For finishing under two hours, I received a Mizuno Cap and a Mizuno wrist band.

On a sad note, the first death for the Shanghai Marathon was recorded in this half marathon. He collapsed about 200m before the finish line. The half marathon race is not a distance you want to run without a good deal of training before hand. Death is the worst that can occur, but there are many other injuries that can result from not training correctly. So if you plan to run the half be sure to find a training plan and train hard for the race. I have found running this distance very fulfilling and I will run the distance next year somewhere on this world!