I had a 4 min : 8 sec PR yesterday over the Team Champs in August. But it took the entire fall season to be able to do that.

The late September Fifth Ave Mile was my next race after the early August five mile Team Championships and so once the mile came along, since it wasn’t very long of a race, I figured I could push more than I was accustomed to and not worry too much about the upcoming marathon season. With that result, along with Jennifer‘s pushing of the McMillan Calculator and I guess Sayo‘s pushing all made me believe that Chicago should be pretty simple but it was Todd that convinced me to race Chicago and not worry about New York “Always race the race in front of you since you don’t know what will happen after.” Still, I wondered if could really go all out in a marathon the way I did in a mile.

Well the race in front of me was actually Grete’s half, which I would run with a pain in my calf that I had not been able to shake off completely since before the Team Championships. A series of NBR folk led by Misha and Sayo convinced me that my Achilles and calf problems could go away with some stretching, rolling and the like. Come Greta’s the calf still hurt but I had Aja on my tail most of the way and I was a little tired of her beating me from behind both in the Scotland Run and the Brooklyn Half; plus, although I thought I was going to take Grete’s easy and rest for Chicago coming up the next weekend, Linda screamed out at me from her bike telling me to PR and “Fuck Chicago”. That brought me back to Todd: the race in front of me right there and then was the one I was in and not Chicago.

I took off three minutes from my half after having taken one and half minutes off the mile the weekend before. I knew that Aja wasn’t taking me from behind on that day; so I slowed to give that calf a break and I did confess to Summer that once I knew I had a PR I pulled back more still, prompting her to coin all my PRs from this year as “fake PRs”. During that week I took stretching and rolling more seriously. I hit the half way mark in Chicago the next Sunday only adding half a minute to my half PR in central park and took 26 minutes off my full from last year’s New York. The next weekend the Front Runners fantastically gave us a 20 mile marathon tour. I slept 8 hours the night before. I have yet to do that before any race. Those were the most comfortable 20 miles I ever ran. Iman, and the Front Runner that works at the Mexican consulate noted and reiterated the ease and speed of my pace just one week out from Chicago. Monday I felt light on my feet. Summertime’s Achilles and calf problems and spring’s planter and shin pains were all gone. Mid October felt incredible. New York neared and the notion of fake PRing was ringing in my head and I started to question how warn out I really was after Chicago if at all. Carla believed there was no way I would not drop whole minutes from Chicago because it would not be as hot in New York. Anna started talking about Boston. I can’t remember what @Karen said but she said it a lot. @charlie and I had the conversation about Boston early the morning of New York. Why not try it now, why not try the race in front of me -for Boston.

I needed to knock off 18 minutes. I knocked off another 10:36 total from New York the year before, the same number of minutes as my age now.

No Boston.

Although I never before believed I could get into Boston, now everyone I run with does.

@Sherry, post Chicago, called my drop from the 09 to 2010 to 2011 marathons an inspiration: post New York she didn’t need to say too much.

Chantel, my fallen Chicago comrade, filled my head with praise; exaggerated or not, it was important for her that I believed it and so I did.

I wasn’t initially registered for the next points race. I didn’t want to obsess over running and so I missed a chance to register for the New Orleans Marathon for virtually nothing. I started playing soccer to do something else for a bit but it still took me two weeks to take two consecutive days off since the New York Marathon. I couldn’t stay away.

@Ken Allen’s offering at track workout: “Everybody is wondering how fast you are going to get” was more serious than “Are you on steroids?”

I don’t know how fast I am going to get but I wanted to know how fast I am now.

Join the Voices became the next race in front of me.

@Katie Winther got me to return to tempo and keep coming back plus she continues to support my Sunday Night Kenyan Night Cap which I still feel does wonders for me.

Morning Doves with Ismael: his watch stopped -and I don’t use one- but he claimed we did low 6 for 6 miles plus…Low sevens was my mark just this spring for that distance in a race.  Ismael was confident about my chances on Sunday and at that point so was I until I could not haul my ass back up the Williamsburg Bridge.

Coffee Run: Lou saw me hauling my ass back up the Williamsburg Bridge: “when did you get so fast?”.

Race day came at the end of a ruff two weeks but that didn’t seem to matter. No sleep; but I have trained for that too. I didn’t know the race was about cancer research. I thought it was some Christmassy choir thing.

I started from behind in red and kept passing people except on those hills… Then I remembered Owen from the early Nite Owls’ days. “shorten your stride up hill…let your self fall on the down hill” tuck in your legs high and then bring them to the front and feel the turn over become automatic. -Raise the top of your head.  The hills were gone.

I know there were people cheering, I know I passed people and didn’t turn to look at them.

I didn’t need to look at you because all your faces were pretty damn clear in my mind.

In short, to find the answer to questions about my improvement is to just take a look at the kind of people you have around you: Go team.

-Fernando Feria