RunnersWorld reportsLet’s hope this Boston Marathon proves to be a happier occasion than your last one.
Jason Lehmkuhle: Let’s just say I learned a lot from my first Boston experience. And it did not end well at all. I’m going in this time fully understanding the entire process – what I’m getting into and what the course is like. I’m hoping, keeping my fingers crossed, that I’ve prepared a whole lot more, a whole lot better than I did a few years ago when I ran.
That was 2007, the year Boston was anticipating a massive blizzard and almost called off the marathon, right?
JL: Yeah. Right up until that morning, they were getting regular updates and they were kind of going back and forth on whether or not they were really sure we were even going to go (start). I don’t know how much of a disaster it would be to have to actually cancel the Boston Marathon. The weather forecasts were pretty brutal. They were talking about several inches of snow and 50-mile-an-hour winds. By the time we got to the start, it wasn’t nearly that bad. But what they were talking about to potentially happen would have been a really, really big mess.
Did you end up with something like freezing rain?
JL: It wasn’t exactly nice – not as bad as what they were predicting. There was pretty steady maybe 15 to 25, maybe 30-mile-an-hour wind in your face and off and on rain. I won’t even say freezing rain – more like just rain.
And when you say it didn’t “end well,” was it really in the latter parts of the race that you had trouble or did you have trouble the whole way through?
JL: It was an odd marathon experience for me. The pace was kind of erratic, because nobody wanted to fight into that wind. There was a giant pack of guys that kind of started out, and we were bouncing between 5:45 miles and 5:00 miles. You’re more worried about just managing yourself in that pack. There are 50 guys and it’s hard to get to the drink stations. It’s more of an issue of dealing with that, kind of chopping your stride a bunch in the first 10 miles of the race. Then things opened up a little bit and I’d say around 15 miles, I realized that my quads were just really, really sore. I’m assuming that had everything to do with the downhills in the first half at Boston. My energy level, really, throughout the race was really, really good. But at a certain point – 18, 19 miles, right even before Heartbreak – I didn’t think that my legs were going to let me get there. I actually made it halfway up Heartbreak with the lead pack, but I couldn’t be excited about it because I was just sure it was going to be a real struggle for me to get to the finish at some point. And at about 22 or 23 miles, things really started to go bad. My hamstrings were now cramping a little bit and my quads were just totally seized up.
I actually tried to drop out at the 24-mile mark. When I got there, they gave me the little blanket and said “well, it’s going to be about an hour and a half until the bus can come back and get you.” And at that point, I’m like “I’ll likely catch some kind of hypothermia or freeze by the time they actually get to me,” so in my mind, it was a whole lot smarter to shuffle, jog, walk, whatever to the finish.
You say you’ve prepared better this time. Is there something in advance of the race that you’re going to do to make sure that quad problem doesn’t persist?
JL: Sure. Even during that (2007) build-up, I did a handful of workouts on some hills. But what I learned from that lost Boston is that you really have to address the course you’re going to be running on in your marathon preparation. It’s not enough just to do the right kind of workouts or to do the long runs, you have to do them on the kind of course that you’re preparing for. My next marathon was actually the Olympic Trials in Central Park, which was also going to be hilly. We picked out a couple of different loops here in the area that had some hills that I thought were roughly proportionally like the kinds of hills that I would be seeing in Central Park. We’ve done the same thing with every one of our marathons since. That’s for sure what’s going on with Boston. It’s a bit more of a struggle in Minneapolis in the winter because the paths that they plow tend to be around the rivers and lakes, which are a little flatter. I did a little of training in Phoenix and a little bit of training in Albuquerque. And now that things are melting off (in Minnesota), we’re definitely doing our last few Boston preparation workouts on a couple of different loops here in the city.
There is that temptation in Boston to go fast in that first section because it’s downhill (for nearly 11 miles), and to really start racing – whereas in the New York City Marathon in Brooklyn, you’d be waiting a while until you thought about anything like that. There may be a group in Boston that powers down that hill pretty quickly. Do you have to resist that temptation?
JL: I don’t know if Boston’s different than any other major marathon in that way. It’s never like that for the first mile in New York on the Verrazano Narrows (Bridge), which is uphill, and you usually warm into it. At a certain point, you have to make those decisions. If the lead pack surges away running 4:40 (per mile pace), I’m just not going to follow them because I know that’s suicide. If you run a few marathons, you learn pretty quick that even though it might feel good at mile three to run a couple of 4:40 miles, that’s not for the betterment of the success of your marathon.
Antonio Vega (the 2010 USA Half Marathon champ, also of Team USA Minnesota) will be racing in Boston. Has a lot of your training been with him?
JL: He’s been here (in Minnesota) most of the winter, and like I say, I was out of town a little bit. I was actually training with Patrick Smyth, another one of our team members, in Albuquerque for a month. And then I was training with in Phoenix with Matt Gabrielson for a couple of weeks. There was actually about a five-week stretch where we (he and Vega) weren’t doing specific workouts together. But now it’s back where we’re together now. We’re both racing the Crescent City Classic 10K in New Orleans (on April 3). That’ll be the last tune-up.
What races have you done this year so far?
JL: I did the Mercedes Birmingham Half-Marathon (in Alabama on February 14; he won in 1:03:38). And on March 13, I did Gate River (the USA 15K, where he was fourth).
What was your reason for not doing the USA Half-Marathon in Houston (in January)?
JL: I’d run New York (the marathon in November). I decided before New York that I was not going to try to get ready for Houston. It’s a little bit of a quick turnaround. It’s something I’d done in the past, and in 2008, it had gone really well for me. But the last couple of years, I had run into little injuries either directly before or directly after the Houston Half. I was asking a little much to try to force myself to get ready for it. And I love running that race, they do such a good job down there and it’s such a fast course. I was disappointed not to go, but I think for my build-up for Boston, it was the right decision.
Jason Lehmkuhle: Let’s just say I learned a lot from my first Boston experience. And it did not end well at all. I’m going in this time fully understanding the entire process – what I’m getting into and what the course is like. I’m hoping, keeping my fingers crossed, that I’ve prepared a whole lot more, a whole lot better than I did a few years ago when I ran.
That was 2007, the year Boston was anticipating a massive blizzard and almost called off the marathon, right?
JL: Yeah. Right up until that morning, they were getting regular updates and they were kind of going back and forth on whether or not they were really sure we were even going to go (start). I don’t know how much of a disaster it would be to have to actually cancel the Boston Marathon. The weather forecasts were pretty brutal. They were talking about several inches of snow and 50-mile-an-hour winds. By the time we got to the start, it wasn’t nearly that bad. But what they were talking about to potentially happen would have been a really, really big mess.
Did you end up with something like freezing rain?
JL: It wasn’t exactly nice – not as bad as what they were predicting. There was pretty steady maybe 15 to 25, maybe 30-mile-an-hour wind in your face and off and on rain. I won’t even say freezing rain – more like just rain.
And when you say it didn’t “end well,” was it really in the latter parts of the race that you had trouble or did you have trouble the whole way through?
JL: It was an odd marathon experience for me. The pace was kind of erratic, because nobody wanted to fight into that wind. There was a giant pack of guys that kind of started out, and we were bouncing between 5:45 miles and 5:00 miles. You’re more worried about just managing yourself in that pack. There are 50 guys and it’s hard to get to the drink stations. It’s more of an issue of dealing with that, kind of chopping your stride a bunch in the first 10 miles of the race. Then things opened up a little bit and I’d say around 15 miles, I realized that my quads were just really, really sore. I’m assuming that had everything to do with the downhills in the first half at Boston. My energy level, really, throughout the race was really, really good. But at a certain point – 18, 19 miles, right even before Heartbreak – I didn’t think that my legs were going to let me get there. I actually made it halfway up Heartbreak with the lead pack, but I couldn’t be excited about it because I was just sure it was going to be a real struggle for me to get to the finish at some point. And at about 22 or 23 miles, things really started to go bad. My hamstrings were now cramping a little bit and my quads were just totally seized up.
I actually tried to drop out at the 24-mile mark. When I got there, they gave me the little blanket and said “well, it’s going to be about an hour and a half until the bus can come back and get you.” And at that point, I’m like “I’ll likely catch some kind of hypothermia or freeze by the time they actually get to me,” so in my mind, it was a whole lot smarter to shuffle, jog, walk, whatever to the finish.
You say you’ve prepared better this time. Is there something in advance of the race that you’re going to do to make sure that quad problem doesn’t persist?
JL: Sure. Even during that (2007) build-up, I did a handful of workouts on some hills. But what I learned from that lost Boston is that you really have to address the course you’re going to be running on in your marathon preparation. It’s not enough just to do the right kind of workouts or to do the long runs, you have to do them on the kind of course that you’re preparing for. My next marathon was actually the Olympic Trials in Central Park, which was also going to be hilly. We picked out a couple of different loops here in the area that had some hills that I thought were roughly proportionally like the kinds of hills that I would be seeing in Central Park. We’ve done the same thing with every one of our marathons since. That’s for sure what’s going on with Boston. It’s a bit more of a struggle in Minneapolis in the winter because the paths that they plow tend to be around the rivers and lakes, which are a little flatter. I did a little of training in Phoenix and a little bit of training in Albuquerque. And now that things are melting off (in Minnesota), we’re definitely doing our last few Boston preparation workouts on a couple of different loops here in the city.
There is that temptation in Boston to go fast in that first section because it’s downhill (for nearly 11 miles), and to really start racing – whereas in the New York City Marathon in Brooklyn, you’d be waiting a while until you thought about anything like that. There may be a group in Boston that powers down that hill pretty quickly. Do you have to resist that temptation?
JL: I don’t know if Boston’s different than any other major marathon in that way. It’s never like that for the first mile in New York on the Verrazano Narrows (Bridge), which is uphill, and you usually warm into it. At a certain point, you have to make those decisions. If the lead pack surges away running 4:40 (per mile pace), I’m just not going to follow them because I know that’s suicide. If you run a few marathons, you learn pretty quick that even though it might feel good at mile three to run a couple of 4:40 miles, that’s not for the betterment of the success of your marathon.
Antonio Vega (the 2010 USA Half Marathon champ, also of Team USA Minnesota) will be racing in Boston. Has a lot of your training been with him?
JL: He’s been here (in Minnesota) most of the winter, and like I say, I was out of town a little bit. I was actually training with Patrick Smyth, another one of our team members, in Albuquerque for a month. And then I was training with in Phoenix with Matt Gabrielson for a couple of weeks. There was actually about a five-week stretch where we (he and Vega) weren’t doing specific workouts together. But now it’s back where we’re together now. We’re both racing the Crescent City Classic 10K in New Orleans (on April 3). That’ll be the last tune-up.
What races have you done this year so far?
JL: I did the Mercedes Birmingham Half-Marathon (in Alabama on February 14; he won in 1:03:38). And on March 13, I did Gate River (the USA 15K, where he was fourth).
What was your reason for not doing the USA Half-Marathon in Houston (in January)?
JL: I’d run New York (the marathon in November). I decided before New York that I was not going to try to get ready for Houston. It’s a little bit of a quick turnaround. It’s something I’d done in the past, and in 2008, it had gone really well for me. But the last couple of years, I had run into little injuries either directly before or directly after the Houston Half. I was asking a little much to try to force myself to get ready for it. And I love running that race, they do such a good job down there and it’s such a fast course. I was disappointed not to go, but I think for my build-up for Boston, it was the right decision.
ShareThis