The course was out and back, and repeat another for full marathon around Lake Hefner. I got up at 3am, and drove to OKC for 6:30am start. The gun went off exactly on time. Full and half marathoners were thrown in together.
For the first segment (to the out turn around), I tried to keep slow pace, but at times, I was going way fast..and I was going to pay for it later on. I was at 56:30 at turnaround. Coming back was quite abit harder due to strong south winds. I slowed down quite abit and threw in some walking. I got back to start area in 2 hrs 3 mins.
On my second out segment, I decided to take much slower and not push it. With strong south wind (tailwind), my quads are actually taking a beating. At every aid station, I just stop and drank lots of water. Temps were on the rise by mid morning. On this segment, it took me hour and 22 minutes. I had slowed alot. My feet felt fine. The wind was basically taking a toll on me now.
Coming back home on the last segment, I just slowed down and did alot of walking. This was a good time for walking. The winds are really fierce now. At about mile 22, my left quad was acting up. I walk some and run some. This worked out pretty good. I finally rolled into finish line at 4 hrs. 54 min. 46 sec. I had finished my first marathon with vibram 5 fingers. And my feet didn't really hurt much. I'm sure that if the wind was as bad, my time would've been better too. Everyone's time would've been better. Nonetheless, it was a great training run.
DG productions did a wonderful job with the race. Thanks to all volunteers at aid stations, just been out in these winds had to been hard too... maybe even harder.
I hope to run 50K next weekend. Happy Trails!
