Whats the biggest blowup while still finishing a marathon have you seen?

My first marathon I went out in 1:31 and finished in 3:27.

Eight years later I ran my second marathon. Went out in 1:29 and finished in 3:16.

hate the marathon.

Gabriel Anderson in the 1984 Olympics.

Oh wow, I guess people don't comprehend how bad a blowup can be.

My first marathon, I got sick (maybe mono) 6 weeks before the race, and by the last week or two I couldn't jog more than about 2 miles without walking. I shouldn't have started the race. I ran 2 miles @6:45s, the next 4 @9:00s, and finished in 5:42.

My second marathon, I had been having so many GI issues during training that I wanted to do all I could to not have to spend a lot of time in portapotties. The way I avoided that in high school was to not eat for a day before the (5k) race. So I did that here. I came through the half in a little over 90 minutes, and at 14 miles my legs started feeling really hungry. I shouldn't have finished the race. I finished in 4:32.

I have had problems in every marathon I've run. My very best one (injured ~5 weeks before race day, back to uninjured ~5 days before race day) my splits were 1:25/1:44.

I remember this guy from Colorado that was doing the NYC Marathon. He was well known and shooting for an OTQ. The race organizers gave him the VIP treatment - elite bus, elite corral, indoor warm-up at Ocean Breeze. Dude shows up on race day and starts annoying bunch of elites by filming them and getting uncomfortably close to them. Mind you, the pandemic was going on. There was even a rumor that he was acting a bit sus around a woman Olympic medalist.

This guy has some camera gear strapped to his head and goes out at a decent pace but starts to have tummy troubles before too long. About the time he reaches the Bronx, he's walking. Ends up not even breaking three hours after teasing that a 2:18 was in the bag!

This guy has a YouTube channel and uploads a video the day after expressing a bit of disappointment while stuffing his face with a pastrami sando the size of his own head. But then, he spends the entire following week blaming the restauranteurs on New York of forcing overly large portions of well seasoned food on him. Pretty sad story! I hear that he is still chasing the dream and we can only hope that Dutch chefs are not as evil as their Big Apple counterparts.

I went out in a 1:16 and finished with a time of 3:42 at CIM. I spent ~50 minutes lying on the side of the road around mile 23.

I signed up for CIM in the fall of 2019 right after running a 1:11:57 half marathon where I felt very fit and like I held back too much. I figured by the time December 2020 rolled around I would definitely be in shape for sub 2:30 (1:12 converts almost perfectly to 2:30). Then COVID hit. I pretty much stopped training, running maybe 20 miles per week. CIM was cancelled and pushed back to 2021. After almost 2 years of no racing and pathetic training I signed up for a couple college XC races in the fall of 2021. The first one felt so good just to be back at a race. With no real workouts I wasn't going for a time. I accidentally went out in a 4:58 first mile (keep in mind the fastest I had run a mile in the prior two years was maybe a 5:45). My college PR would have won that race but I ended up finishing in a ridiculously slow 29 minutes for 8k. I surprised myself two weeks later by running 27:20 for 8k.

With the marathon coming quickly I figured I would be able to run a 2:45 (6:22 pace) if I paced myself. I did a 15 mile tempo run at 6:15 and was feeling confident in my ability to at a minimum break 3.

Unfortunately CIM had two things that I really like: lots of people to run with and hills. With all the competitors I forgot to pace myself running a 6 minute first mile which quickly dropped down to ~5:45 by 5k. I have a very hard time slowing down when there are moderate hills. In high school hills were my thing. In college I relished any race opportunity with hills. CIM has plenty of hills and I quickly gave up on my target of 6:22 miles and decided to worry about that thing called "pacing" after the half way point by which most of the hills on the course are done. Unsurprisingly a 1:16 didn't bode well for the rest of the race. I started dropping fast. By 30k I was really feeling it. I adjusted my goal to breaking 3 knowing I had ~70 minutes to cover 7.5 miles (my 30k split was ~1:50). I have Raynaud's syndrome so I paid no attention when my hands fell asleep shortly after the half way point. Around mile 19 my forearms started falling asleep. Then my feet. Then my legs. Soon my whole body was tingling from my toes all the way to my scalp. I tried walking for a bit to see if it would go away but no luck. I was barely staggering along and realized there was a decent chance I would stumble and fall over. I decided to choose my falling place instead and flopped onto the first grassy bit of ground next to the road. For the first ~20 minutes I couldn't feel anything besides cold and tingling. When I started regaining feeling everything was cramping. I've had hamstring cramps before but having both legs go off at the same time is no fun (especially with both my calves cramping too). CIM was the only time I've experienced arm cramps as well.

Eventually I felt ready enough to keep going. A police officer and some spectators had come over to see if I was okay (I wasn't) but I told them I didn't need a medic as I wanted to finish. I finished the final 3 miles at ~6:30 pace (all the other finishers at that time were going over 8 minute pace).

Morals of the story:
1. Stick to your race plan
2. Nutrition during marathons is a good idea
3. I'm terrible at being slow lol (my brain wants to pace everything as if I was fit)

I once held onto 3:20 pace for 18 miles, and ended up finishing just under 4 hours. Total death march the last 4 miles or so, legs completely seizing and cramping

Hayley Carruthers crawling over the finish line of the London Marathon in 2019. Still ran 2:33

bbc.co.uk

London Marathon: Hayley Carruthers on crawling across the line

https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews

Hayley Carruthers collapsed at the London Marathon finish line but still beat her personal best time.

Link:www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-48093571

After two brutal marathon blow ups in bad weather conditions I finally 100% learned that you have to respect the distance.

Only hobby jogged one marathon, but I was shocked by how after mile 15 or so, it became a graveyard of runners. For the last 10 miles it felt like I was passing hundreds of runners who are obviously faster than me, but were now limping, walking or staggering.

Massive respect to anyone who blows up and still finishes the distance though.

A guy I know went 1:15/4h+ at Boston (finishing time over 5 hours) in 2018. Med tent with hypothermia, then they let him finish for some reason.

I noticed this at CIM. I was behind many of the female OTQ dreamers. Watching so many people drop was crazy to me. I was under trained, but still pulled through. I just feel if you’re that out of shape, don’t even show up.

I have a true, inverse story. About 9 years ago my wife and I ran a marathon for our honeymoon. I had never run a marathon but had several half marathons in the 120s. My wife wanted to break her PR which was something like 3:42. So I decided I'd just pace her because I wasn't specifically trained for the distance and really didn't want to suffer for 3 hours.

We start running but she is way off pace after just 5k. Too much partying and not running in the 5 days between the race and our wedding. I stick with her until we near the half way, and she begged me to just leave her to her suffering and run on my own. So I did.

Literally as we hit the half way mark in something like 2:01:xx, I go from like 10 minute pace to 6 minute pace (it happened to be downhill at half way). Ran the second half in something like 1:31, so I had legitimate splits of 2:01/1:31 and the RD emailed me asking what was going on with my odd pacing. I hit all timing mats, appeared in all pictures, yet my splits were of course not realistic "on paper."

But they were legit and after I told my story he was cool with it. It was pretty clear when looking at my wife's splits and he could see we hit half in same time.

I was a 2:47 marathoner pre-pandemic but once races were cancelled, I lost the motivation to train hard and reverted to running for fitness.

When in-person races returned, I jumped in a local half just to see where I was at and ran a relatively comfortable 1:32. I then (foolishly) agreed to pace a friend to a sub 3:20 in a marathon the following month, thinking it wouldn’t be too difficult based on my current half time and past fitness.

Well, I ended up getting dropped by said friend in mile 18 and finishing in 3:47 with splits of 1:38/2:09. Those last 8+ miles were the most painful experience of my life. The highlight of my race was my finishing “sprint” in the last 0.2 mi to avoid the shame of losing to my past self by over an hour lol (avoided it by mere seconds).

I should have known better but I can look back on it and laugh now.

Lol, this is hilarious. I might watch his videos from that race to see how weird the filming was.

What does “went out in 1:30” mean? You blew up and started walking after an hour and half? Or were running 1:30 half marathon pace in the first half and did 2:30 half marathon pace for the rest? Or what?

Also, the worst blow ups are the ones that don't even finish. The marathon distance is full of them. My buddies had some bad food before a 'thon and didn't make it past mile 17 or so. They tell that the story all the time.

My first 'thon absolutely humbled me. Went out with a sub-2:50 goal, settled into a comfortable pace that was sub-2:45, and somehow become the unofficial pace setter for the sub-2:45 group and also female race leader. Went through the half in 1:22, on pace, feeling good. Started dragging during mile 20. Was walking by mile 23. Hobbled home at easy pace. Finished in 2:56, so 1:34 2nd half isn't nearly as bad as some posters here, but that last 10k took me 50 minutes. Told myself I would never run another marathon. But I got a Boston Q, so I'll never run another one after Boston.

Moral of the story is respect the marathon and the weather of the day. Anything can happen during the last 10k.

Every marathon Chris Caulkins ever ran. Dude is a legend.