Post-Marathon Mangüanga Is Over After Playing Rock & Roll

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mangüanga (Mahn-guahn-gah): In Venezuela, state of being lazy; doing easy things avoiding hard work.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I have been playing around, after my May 29^th Idaho Marathon. Though I have continued doing speed work, I have run only twice a week and avoided long runs. Most of the weekends have been dedicated to short races: 5K, 10K & 12K.

As I am running Ragnar Relay at the end of July, I still need to do shorter runs closer in time to mimic the relay (3 runs in less than 24 hrs). I will still run some short races for that purpose during the weekends, but I am definitely increasing the mileage during the week and bringing back to my training the long runs: No question about it.

The Rock & Roll in Seattle was the run that closes my “playing period” and puts me back to marathon training schedule (though I am not final in which marathon I'll run this Fall).  I picked up my friend Emily and drove to North downtown to catch the shuttle from the Westin.  We got there around 5 am and there were tons of buses, so we didn't even have to wait a bit. When we got to Tukwila the lines for the porta-potty were already long (not such luck like the buses line) so we decided to start the process, and of course, repeat. We perused around, saw some of the Chuckit pacers and tried to find unsuccessfully my Sole Sisters.

Emily and I were together in corral 9. We discussed the respective strategies which were a PR for me working through heart rate, and a "doesn't know" for her. I told her to go and run her race without even thinking on waiting for me.

I got to recognize that I was lost the first 3 miles. I didn't have a clue where I was as it looked all industrial and blah. I have run in many new places consciously knowing that I don't know the place. But running in the greater Seattle and not knowing where I was, mentally bothered me. I was looking forward mile 3ish where I would be entering in familiar territory and climbing the first big hill of the race according to the course map. I climbed it without changing the pace, of course, increasing my HR, and I thought, wow, that hill didn't look that bad. The display of American flags along gorgeous Lake Washington, also displayed during the Seattle Marathon in November, was for me the highlight of the course. As during the November event, I touched every flag while I ran. It's just my need to honor the Ol' Glory and our fallen soldiers.

Everything was in perfect harmony for a PR, until I entered the tunnel at mile 9. Hundreds of runners inside a very long stuffy tunnel (0.8 miles). The air was stagnated and it was very difficult to breath. My pace dropped dramatically, and it took me a while to recover even after getting back to fresh air. At the end of the tunnel, when I saw the light, and could breathe again, I was able to recover and pick up the pace, but not fast enough to break my PR of 2:10:03. I clocked 2:10:58.

Post-Marathon Mangüanga Is Over After Playing Rock & Roll.  

With my good friend Emily who ran a fantastic 1:56. We had an awesome time together.

Went for a PR but couldn't get it. I was dead from mile 7 to the end of the tunnel at mile 9... hundreds of runners in that closed muggy environment killed me.