Łódź DOZ Maraton, Łódź 20170423

Marathon race in my home town Lodz.
It was an obvious race on my list and this year I managed to combine Easter visit with running it since it was just one week later. I also had high expectations due to several factors:
- earlier half marathon results (~1:25')
- pretty hard preparations for breaking 3h mark
- weather forecast for low temps (definitely my kind of running weather)
- and finally the presence of pacemaker for my goal time :-D

I also had some doubts and concerns that 3h are way too optimistic for me due to:
- a little bit low millage in last weeks
- a lot of food during Easter vacation :-P and general poor weight :-/
- rather huge improvement from my previous PB standing @3:11'!!!
- and finally, getting late to the start line!! (a rookie mistake that I still cant believe I did)

Anyway, my warmup was actually an 800m jog from the car to the start line! I got to my block exactly 2' before it was closed and 8' before the start of the race. That was it, I was pretty much cold! I managed to stretch a bit in the block, relax for 1' and off I went... I quickly found the pacemaker with "3:00" balloon and stuck with him - that was the plan, plain and dead simple.
First 5k were 'ok'. My HR was rather high (~150bpm) and I was hoping it would stay even around 140 for the first 5-8k but I was feeling comfortable with the pace. Looking at my autolap splits, the pacemaker guy was doing ~4:10/km which was faster than required 4:15/km but we had tail wind so it didnt feel wrong or fast at all.
Around 8th kilometer, tail wind changed to head wind and route went to some mild climb section, yet the group was still doing faster splits. This is where I didnt like it and started to drop a bit trying to run closer to 4:15... At 11th kilometer I noticed some random runner whose T-shirt said "Road to <03:00:00" and asked him if he actually targets this time. This way I found myself a new, unofficial pacemaker :-P since the official one was already at least 150m in front! and I had already ~30" margin! Anyway, in a much smaller groupd (~5-6 runners) we were doing even splits of 4:12-4:16/km depending on wind and grade, which felt much more natural.
Very happy with my new running mates and feeling very well, I pretty much dont recall kilometers from 12th to 21st at all! Like they never happened. And my 150bpm at 2nd kilometer that were disturbing me, now still were 150bpm at 21st kilometer which meant they were awesome :-D
I hit half marathon mark at ~1:28'30, stunning 90" below target time. I think this boosted my confidence a lot since I was still feeling great. Next section until 25th kilometer was pleasant with mild descent and tails winds. Splits around 4:10/km felt very easy and Hr stayed low. First signs of fatigue started somewhere between 25th and 28th kilometer, but nothing terribly worrying. The real first doubt appeared at 29th kilometer: after left turn we hit a 500m long 2% climb with very strong head winds! Even though I was not in the front of the pack, I felt the wind a lot! The whole group slowed down to sthg like 4:30-4:35/km and still we were catching up to multiple runners with just seconds! My HR jumped rapidly to 160bpm and I was a bit worried, since I knew we will continue with head winds for another 1,5k...
well, the good news was that after 500m the ground got flat and then even with tiny 0.5% downhill grade. We also gathered more runners and we were now ~30 people pack! And finally, head winds became side winds and were no longer such a threat. First crisis was over :-D pace was back to 4:15/km, HR down to 150-155bpm and very soon we hit 30km marker - somehow I thought at that moment that it was important milestone :-P
Everything was still going good from 30th to 35th kilometer. Pace was stable, HR too, winds were even helping. Since I was still fine at 35th k and was actually about 90"-100" ahead for a 3h finish, I kind of felt that nothing can go wrong at this point... Well, it did but not for me... My fellow pacemaker was actually pacing his friend for a 3h finish, and this friend of him started to collapse... He said he cant maintain 4:15/km anymore and that he needs to slow down a bit. This is were we split and wished each other a good rest of the race. Bottom line the whole group kind of broke and everyone was running their own race. I think it was a tiny mistake since at 37th kilometer we again hit very strong head winds and I was struggling (I guess everyone else too) to keep 4:20/km with HR jumping to 165bpm. Luckily this was only one kilometer and soon we turned around and got tail winds for the rest 4km. This is were I relaxed and knew I will make it. And I will make it easily and with huge margin.
Keeping ~4:18-4:20/km pace, I entered the finish line in Atlas arena in 2:58:36! Time that I once considered impossible! 3h were broken and I was actually feeling pretty fresh! DONE!