This morning
I woke up at 5:30am and I was ready to drive to Rome at 6:00. We (12 people from 6 different
towns) were supposed to meet in front of my house at that time, the last person
of 12 eventually arrived at 6:15 when the rest of the group was already anxious
to leave. A few jokes to relax and we were on our way to Rome,
we left our cars at one of the subway stations outside Rome, we used the facilities at the station
and then we boarded the train that was crowded at 7:00 am on Sunday like on
rush hours on Monday morning. We reached the Colosseo starting area, we quickly
dropped our bags and headed to our corrals. Inside the corral I was sitting on
the cobblestone just 40 meters from the starting line watching all the elite
athletes warming up. The sun was up and just sitting there I was already hot. At
9:00 the wheelchair athletes started, at 9:05 we started. It was amazing
watching the top elites immediately creating a gap in just 100 meters and disappearing
right after the first turn. At that point I started concentrating on my own
task. My goal was to keep 5:00/km until it was no longer possible. My first 5k
were actually a little bit faster (4:52/km) because I didn’t want to be passed by
the whole crowd and then I settled down on a more regular pace. After 10k I was
fine, running was smooth and breathing was regular, but I was already drenched
in sweat, I used any aid and “sponge” station to water myself inside and
outside. At km 17 we
reached St Peter and it was the usual incredible view, I was shivering in front
of the emptiness of the St Peter plaza (it means I am getting old and cheesy).
I reached the half way in 1:46 and still somehow in control, but my legs were
stuck on one speed and that one only and I knew immediately that I would end up
slowing down progressively. Next 5k were the new part of the course, that was
much better than the last editions when we were running for 2k on a freeway
along with cars on the next lane, I was slowing down to 5:20-5:30/km, but I
didn’t have any desire to push the pace and to die to finish in 3:30 and I kept
whatever pace I had because it was the fastest way to reach the finish line. Once
I reached mile 20 we entered Rome
downtown and there I felt much better (not a “second wind” but something
similar), lots of people on the streets and I thought I could still finish
under 3:40. Until km 38 I was still in good shape, then the last 4 k were a struggle
to survive. This is the hardest part of the course because there are a few hills
especially in the last 2 k, the cobblestone is so uneven that feels like
running on a rocky trail and my pace went down to 5:40-5:50 and then I did it
the last 2.2k in 13 minutes and change.
I was happy
to have finished another marathon and my legs were not dead at the end, I took
a 5 minutes nap while waiting for the others and immediately felt great. My current marathon
fitness is around 3:38 (my last 2 marathon times) and today if the course was
not so slow it would have probably been the same time. I would like to think that
is not possible that I have lost almost 30 minutes (in my marathon time) since October,
even though I ran fewer miles and without much speed. I did the last three
marathons with the idea of training through them and finishing them
without crashing, but the net result was that I trained through them and I
crashed at the end of each of them, just because I didn’t care much about the
final result and I “accepted” the slow down. I was somehow “defeated” without
fighting and when the mind is not there the body fell apart (in the last two weekends I did two medium runs much faster than today's marathon pace).
Rome marathon still remains an
incredible experience giving the runners the possibility to run through some
beautiful place, but it requires lots of respect because it is much slower and
harder than altitude profile shows. Except for a friend of mine who did his PB,
the rest of our group crashed big time, as I did, but at least they were
chasing their PB.
In a couple
of days I will be able to run again and from there I will start rebuilding my
confidence for the upcoming races.
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