Marathon Weekend 2023

[dobball23]

Had an awesome run today! I started talking to Coach Billy, @DopeyBadger this summer about goals and plans for Dopey. When it came time for him to build my training plan I told him my one goal was to finally break 4 hours in the marathon. Not only did his plan help me get there, but I absolutely crushed the time with an unofficial time of 3:50:45 on the tracking site, and destroyed my old PR of 4:28!! Huge thanks to Billy for the awesome training plan and to those at the meet up these last few days that seemed to be way more confident in my ability to achieve this than I was!!

Congrats on your achievement!

@DopeyBadger is awesome! I notched a 3:28 PR today thanks in large part to his guidance.

 

[surfde22]

Congrats on your achievement!

@DopeyBadger is awesome! I notched a 3:28 PR today thanks in large part to his guidance.

Congrats to you too!!

 

[fatmanatee]

Had an awesome run today! I started talking to Coach Billy, @DopeyBadger this summer about goals and plans for Dopey. When it came time for him to build my training plan I told him my one goal was to finally break 4 hours in the marathon. Not only did his plan help me get there, but I absolutely crushed the time with an unofficial time of 3:50:45 on the tracking site, and destroyed my old PR of 4:28!! Huge thanks to Billy for the awesome training plan and to those at the meet up these last few days that seemed to be way more confident in my ability to achieve this than I was!!

Congrats! This’ll be my goal if I decide to give it another go at the marathon, seems like the plan worked fantastically.

 

[lookingforsunshine]

@NYC_MW has finished!!! Way to go!!

 

[Z-Knight]

I started with the Galloway 4:30 pacer in Corral C... Either I'm not smart on pacers or this guy was way off, but we were on a 4:30 clock pace NOT our pace. Since we started 10 minutes after the clock started he had us running way faster and hence would have actually finished in 4:20 or probably faster. The majority of the group fell apart at mile 15, or so, and I kept up till mile 19 running 9:30 miles instead of 10:18...I was pissed.

Edit: based on tracking we did the half in 2:07 so on pace for 4:14...turns out pacer finished it in 4:21 cause he slowed down the last 6 miles. Sheesh

 

[surfde22]

Congrats! This’ll be my goal if I decide to give it another go at the marathon, seems like the plan worked fantastically.

Thanks! Billy does great plans, but he’s is definitely to stay consistent. I didn’t miss a single training run on his plan and gave me all the confidence I needed.

 

[Dom497]

Wow what an experience that was!
This was my first time running any of the races and now I'm thinking that running through the BB parking lot is actually better than WWoS. The highway to get to BB and the stretch after was torture with the parking lot giving a break from the torture. Knowing that to get to WWoS required a super long highway stretch, I now think that would be super torturous lol.

 

[steph0808]

I've completed Dopey!!!

Thank you to everyone on here and at the meet-ups for the encouragement even when I was under the weather (still felt crappy until mile 8 today).

But I got huge adrenaline boosts at mile 12 (seeing my kids outside VGF), mile 17 (riding Everest), and mile 23 (riding Tower of Terror), and they carried me through the race.

And my last three miles were my fastest - all under 10.

Thanks to Billy for a plan that obviously works even when under the weather! My races weren't fast, but they got done!!

 

[Zutroy]

I started with the Galloway 4:30 pacer in Corral C... Either I'm not smart on pacers or this guy was way off, but we were on a 4:30 clock pace NOT our pace. Since we started 10 minutes after the clock started he had us running way faster and hence would have actually finished in 4:20 or probably faster. The majority of the group fell apart at mile 15, or so, and I kept up till mile 19 running 9:30 miles instead of 10:18...I was pissed.

The pacers seemed off to me. I started at the same time as the 3:30 pacer, and unless they made up some time at the end, I’m not sure if they hit their pace. That pacer also started off really hot, and definitely had faded when I passed him as I was leaving Blizzard Beach.

 

[BKostecki]

Congrats to all marathoners, Goofys, and Dopeys! Great race in great conditions today. Missed my PR by 30 seconds. Probably would have beaten it if I hadn’t decided to crush my half marathon PR yesterday for some reason. Just happy to be running pain-free after working through a lot of SI joint pain over the past few years (turmeric is a lifesaver!). Thank you all again for the motivation and wisdom!

 

[Dopey 2020]

Super excited! Stuck to my weekend plan of 10/mile for the first three to try for 8:30/mile in the marathon. Lined up with the 3:40 pacer and managed to keep with them until mile 22+ when I had to back down to keep the wheels from falling off. Ended pacing myself the rest to a 3:45:03 ( unofficially)
NEW PR by more than three minutes!

 

[Dopey 2020]

Congrats to all the finishers and soon to be finishers!!!

 

[AaronB]

Had a good race, and weather was pretty good. Was a little concerned with humidity, since that is my Achille's Heel, but it didn't really bother me too bad.

Anyone else get caught in the starting coral confusion? I was coral B, and started heading back about 4:15AM, and at one junction they started sending people a different way saying all corals this way now. Then when we got up to the start area (roughly 4:45AM) they were telling people arriving we were late and were only allowed in coral F. They tried to enforce that but there were hundreds of runners still coming up and eventually people just started opening gates and hoping fences to get to the more forward corals, and they were letting people through. They were trying to say the corals were closed because with the loopback they had to clear the course, but the entrances to the corals were on the grass median which was clear, so no clue why they were trying to hold people. Anyway, was a little stressful but eventually got out towards the end of C, which was fine.

 

[Baloo in MI]

Congrats everyone. My goal for today was to put a 4 at the front of my marathon time. Since my tendon injury in 2018 I have not been able to find the same speed I had pre-injury. Snice 2019 I have not been able to go sub 5, This was my goal at NYCM in November and that was a disaster! So going into Dopey I really wanted that 4:XX:XX, Frankly I would be happy with 4:59.99 but instead I got 4:40.36! I am so happy, trained hard for this and worked hard today. I do think a sub 4:30 is still in me. Today’s race gave me confidence to set that as my next goal!

So happy with this weekend, and today! I hope everyone has good experiences and can get out into the parks and show off our bling! I got a date with family for GOTG this evening!

 

[NYC_MW]

Wow what an experience that was!
This was my first time running any of the races and now I'm thinking that running through the BB parking lot is actually better than WWoS. The highway to get to BB and the stretch after was torture with the parking lot giving a break from the torture. Knowing that to get to WWoS required a super long highway stretch, I know think that would be super torture lol.

Yes! The parking lot was so much better than that stretch from AK to the lot.

 

[surfde22]

Yes! The parking lot was so much better than that stretch from AK to the lot.

They definitely had the jams going in the parking lot which was appreciated since my ear buds died around mile 17

 

[furiated]

I started with the Galloway 4:30 pacer in Corral C... Either I'm not smart on pacers or this guy was way off, but we were on a 4:30 clock pace NOT our pace. Since we started 10 minutes after the clock started he had us running way faster and hence would have actually finished in 4:20 or probably faster. The majority of the group fell apart at mile 15, or so, and I kept up till mile 19 running 9:30 miles instead of 10:18...I was pissed.

In more pace group weirdness, as I was leaving AK I saw a pace group going in, and I always check their time when I see one to know what paces are ahead of or behind me. I saw that it was 6:30. Not even a minute later, the 6:45 group went by. Other runners around me noticed and we were all like Didn't the 6:30 group just go by? One of them was definitely off.

 

[Z-Knight]

In more pace group weirdness, as I was leaving AK I saw a pace group going in, and I always check their time when I see one to know what paces are ahead of or behind me. I saw that it was 6:30. Not even a minute later, the 6:45 group went by. Other runners around me noticed and we were all like Didn't the 6:30 group just go by? One of them was definitely off.

Yeah... I don't what was going on. But I just checked my times and I crossed the halfway point in 2:07 and I started with the 4:30 pacer... He was definitely on pace for a 4:15 overall.

I'm pretty sure my pacer was looking at his mile marker card because he had it on his stick right in his face and was trying to match the time with the clock times at the digital mile markers.. He didn't consider we started 10 minutes later so was pushing it all the way. I would not be surprised if he passed the 4:15 pacer somewhere and then realized he messed it up. I could have tried to keep up another 2 or 3 miles but I was starting to slow down at 19 when we turned on the long road to Blizzard so I just gave up.

 

[Z-Knight]

Super excited! Stuck to my weekend plan of 10/mile for the first three to try for 8:30/mile in the marathon. Lined up with the 3:40 pacer and managed to keep with them until mile 22+ when I had to back down to keep the wheels from falling off. Ended pacing myself the rest to a 3:45:03 ( unofficially)
NEW PR by more than three minutes!

View attachment 730540

Nice.. Now you might need to change name to Dopey 2023

 

[accm]

What an amazing race! I’ve been dealing with on/off injuries since October so I went in with no idea what to expect. Thank you to @DopeyBadger for not one, but two training plans. I wasn’t able to follow it was well as I had hoped, but I still finished feeling so strong. Not once during the race did it ever cross my mind that I couldn’t do it.

Congratulations to everyone that ran this weekend! It’s been so nice spending the last year talking to you all!