Mile 1 6:27 found my teammates and took it out up the Verrazano Narrows about twenty seconds harder than each of the last two years.
Mile 2 5:39 relaxed down the bridge in a big group.
Mile 3 6:04? and 3.1 at 18:48 a bit slower with the uphill after the bridge. stayed with most in the group but did not feel like it was going to be a great day.
Mile 5 5:57 avg for 2M/30:05? missed mile 4 marker, so, pleasantly surprised to have gone sub six pace for the past two miles. holding to plan (go out a bit faster on mile 1, ease back on mile 2, and then try to go six minute pace and see how it felt). staying with a nice group, some drafting: felt very easy. headwind strong throughout first half of race in Brooklyn.
Mile 6 5:57?/36:02? still easy. may have been around here or in the next mile where I moved ahead of my group because the pace felt so easy. Wind really penalized the attempt to move up, but I was able to run with some other guys for most of Brooklyn.
Mile 7 5:56?/41:58? psyched to be under six minute pace and started to think that I could do it for the whole race but paid a price for moving up against the wind.
mile 8-10 slowed a bit on tenth mile to just over 1 hr for the first ten.
miles 11-13 bit over six. hill in the silent part of Williamsburg where the orthodox do not cheer or for the most part even watch. unclear on the splits because I was running by feel and not paying much attention to time.
13.1 1:19:11 (gun time). must have just passed first time marathoner on the Pulaski bridge or just before that. He wasn't the guy with the Cancer center jersey, was he?
15 6:20s up the Queensboro Bridge. remembered that my family was probably keeping up on the athlete tracker and that gave me a lift.
16-20 low 6 down the bridge (took second gel (wouldn't take any more to avoid cramps, maybe a mistake) and pretty much maintained that pace up First Avenue to the Bronx. started to pass a lot of people.
hit 20 at 2:01:42 and had to go sub 38:18 10k to close under 2:40.
21 6:21? faded a bit in the Bronx, especially on the hill up to the bridge back to Manhattan.
22 low 6 feeling a sense of urgency
23 5:59 really got going in Harlem despite half colliding with some idiot older woman crossing the street.
24 6:21? struggled on the Fifth Avenue hill, maybe because I skipped the third gel.
25 6:03 really pushed hard in the park through the hills
26 6:02 passed very quickly by a German at the bottom of the park and decided that if I didn't stick to him I would not break 2:40. I stuck with him up the hill, got the inside on the turn from Columbus Circle. We were going good inside the park and the crowd was roaring and I saw 2:38:36 on the clock at 26, so I knew I had it. I hammered up the hill, dropped the German by about ten or fifteen seconds, and closed .2 in 69 seconds.
officially, 2:39:46. completely psyched about this, a 42 second pr off of much worse shape than last year after only 1 month of workouts, following a calf injury in early September. I credit long tempos (10 miles plus) and strength workouts (7x1M (200m rest) in about 5:40), as well as running more the final week than last year (31 vs. 17 prior to the marathon, including 2 the day before).