I passed the drummers near the crest of Diamond Head Rd just south of the Diamond Head State Monument around Mile 8 (also Mile 24.5) of last December's Honolulu Marathon. They were still setting things up in their tent under the predawn light (race start was at 5 am) overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The view was, as I’d already experienced in my training runs over the previous weeks, simply gorgeous. At the time, with my legs still feeling good (don’t they always in the first 10 miles of a marathon?!) and the forecast heat and humidity not yet out in full force, I didn’t pay that much attention to those drummers.
Some 16 miles later, though, on the way back up Diamond Head Rd, those drummers were a welcomed sight and sound.
I was using their rhythmic sound to help maintain my pace up the hill. And, then, in passing the drummers, I got a much-needed recharge for the last 1.5 miles to the finish.
Having run the Wineglass Marathon in early October of last year, where I went out too fast, faster than my interrupted training could support (in hindsight), I was a lot more conservative in the early miles through downtown Honolulu. It was also a lot warmer and more humid. The result was an overall much more even-paced run, compared with Wineglass, where I banked some time (unplanned!) in the first 10-15 miles but had to walk quite a bit toward the end.
Banking time usually doesn’t end well, as in Wineglass last year, and is generally not a good strategy. This is so, even though, more even paced doesn’t always mean faster. My finish time for Honolulu was about the same as that for Wineglass (~5:20). But Honolulu, though a lot warmer and more humid, felt a lot better! And, the Honolulu pace chart also looks a lot better than that for Wineglass!
|
|
Honolulu
Marathon 2023 |
Wineglass
Marathon 2023 |
|
Alternating
walking and running |
Began Mile 22 |
Began Mile 20 |
|
All walking |
None |
2 miles |
|
End spurt |
~1 mile |
~0.5 mile |
The Honolulu Marathon is a major international race. Typically, there are 30,000+ runners (40+% of which are from Japan). The race expo was the biggest that I’ve ever seen and very smoothly run. A big attraction of the expo was, not surprisingly, the two pure gold medals for the two winners of the race (each 202.3 g, worth about $15K).
The Honolulu Marathon is also a major local event, with a
program covering the entire long weekend, from entertainment to shorter races,
ending with the marathon on Sunday. Aloha Friday night kicked off the fun in Waikiki
Beach Walk Plaza on Lewers St., with a variety of hula performances, plus those
by Kapena, a popular Hawaiian `ohana band,
playing a blend of traditional Hawaiian and contemporary music.
The fun continued Saturday morning with the Kalakaua Merrie
mile, where several T. Rex’s showed up. Why T. Rex? Well, I kind of knew that
Hawaii was involved in the movie, Jurassic Park, but not the details until I
talked with one of the staff members of the Ho`omaluhia Botanical Garden. The
latter is not the actual site where Jurassic Park was filmed; but driving
through its 400 acres of tropical plants (from around the world) right away
reminded me of the movie. The actual site (Kualoa Ranch) is just up Kamehameha
Hwy (Rte 83) along the east coast of O`ahu.
The main event that all this fun was building up to was, of course, the marathon itself very early on Sunday. My TL;DR summary review of the race: efficiently organized; gorgeous scenery (though less than expected); terrific volunteer support; wonderful Aloha Spirit all around; had a great time running it; would run it again, if the opportunity arises. To be fair, I was there on vacation, and the marathon was a “race of opportunity,” i.e., I didn’t fly out there just for the race.
There are, though, a couple of nits I do have about the
start of the race. First, more porta potties are needed! Good thing the starting
line was next to the Ala Moana Regional Park, which had restrooms. But, of
course, once people realized, long lines started to form there too.
Second, a somewhat bigger nit, corrals should be enforced, along with wave starts! I was assigned the “Blue Zone,” but no zones were visible at all. And, very quickly, as runners streamed into the starting area along the not very wide Ala Moana Blvd. before the 5 am start, practically no space was visible either. It also seemed that the walkers all corralled themselves near the starting line, so it was hard to get into any kind of running rhythm for the first couple miles. Aloha Spirit, sure, but come on, these issues could be easily remedied! The pre-start fireworks, though, were great!
Oh, did I mention it was warm and humid?! Along with the marathon, there was a companion Start to Park 10K, in which some 7,000 people ran. A number of elites from around the world came to run the 10K for heat and humidity training. Molly Seidel, the 2021 Olympic marathon bronze medalist, ran it and was second overall (32:25).
Race day was not as breezy as in previous weeks. The first
four miles through downtown Honolulu were quite muggy. It got better just
before Mile 4, as the route emerged from Piikoi St. back onto Ala Moana Blvd. with
its shoreline breeze. It was around there that I realized that I’d forgotten
my SaltSticks, which I’d started to use after that weird cramping experience in
the 2018 Potomac Marathon. For the rest of the race, I paced even more conservatively
and went for Gatorade more than water at the aid stations.
Aloha Spirit was all around the aid stations, and that Spirit was more and more welcomed toward the latter miles (see video of drummers above). Some of the aid stations had, in addition to water in paper cups, water from tubing connected to hydrants. That’s a first for me. It’s a bit wasteful of water. But, it does save paper cups and is great for cooling off. Of course, one would need to bring their own bottle, which I did. It was the first time I had my own bottle (in a hydration vest) for a marathon. I plan to do that in future races, for more flexibility in hydration and fueling.
As mentioned previously, I was on the island for vacation, and the Honolulu Marathon date just so happened to be on the Sunday before I flew out later that week. So, I was fortunate to be able to have trained there for a month before the race to get more acclimated to the heat and humidity than otherwise. Also, on the many training runs during that month, I was able to get familiarized with most of the race course (miles 1-13 and 20-26). The seven miles between miles 13 and 20 along the Kalaniana`ole Hwy (Rte 72), basically an out-and-back to Hawaii Kai, are the only miles I didn’t run beforehand. I also did some non-race course training runs, the prettiest one of which was the early morning run up Diamond Head State Monument. Highly recommended!
From top of Diamond Head State Monument, looking northwest toward Waikiki, O`ahu.
Being familiar with a race course has its advantages. One would know, e.g., where a long climb is coming up and could mentally prepare for it. Disadvantages, too—one would know where that dreaded long climb is coming up. 😆
Maybe because Christmas was just a couple weeks away at the time, that Christmas song, Here Comes Santa Claus, kept popping up in my head, during the latter miles especially. And, maybe because its rhythm matched my stride rhythm, I couldn’t get it out of my head. Not sure if that resulted in + or – a few minutes in my finish time. 😊
