On 13th October, I took part in the Chicago Marathon which was my 19th marathon overall and 14th World Marathon Major. I had previous run the 2018 Chicago Marathon where I had aimed for a 3:20 but fell short running 3:41.

This time, when I signed up I had a big scary goal of attempting to run under 2hrs 50min that would have been over a 7min PB. As the training block progressed it became apparent that running the pace required to go sub 2:50 wouldn’t be possible this time. I have suffered with back and neck mobility issues after collapsing at the 2024 Boston Marathon. I had hoped I would be able to run as planned despite the injuries from that fall but it wasn’t possible. Often I had to cut back the weekly mileage to reduce the back pain.

As the weeks went by, those back mobility issues started to have a knock on effect in other areas. Firstly a tight IT band and then a groin strain which massively hampered the last 6 weeks of training. I had to really drop the mileage down to get through those last weeks. I was able to run the 2024 Berlin Marathon two weeks before Chicago.

I arrived into Chicago on the Friday afternoon and made my way straight over to the Bib Pick Up and Expo. Saturday morning I ran the Lululemon Chicago Shakeout run and the groin didn’t feel too bad running at that pace. I spent Saturday afternoon relaxing in the hotel and getting my Chicago Marathon Gear ready for tomorrow morning.

I was in bed for 8pm with a 4am alarm set for tomorrow ahead of the 30min walk down to the start area.

Walk To Grant Park

I left my hotel at 5:30am and headed down to the park, I was in Corral C and entering through gate 3.

The walk down to the park was straight forward enough at that time of the morning. Not much traffic on the road and loads of runners all headed in the same direction.

Start Area

Getting into the start area was a quick and efficient process. The security check was a matter of walking through a scanner carrying your bag. No water bottles were checked or emptied out which the pre-race material had mentioned could have happened.

I run carrying a bottle of electrolytes so I had taken an empty bottle with the powder to mix in separately. In the start area they have water filling stations dotted around so it was easy enough to fill it there but just adds one thing to do whilst waiting around, I would prefer to be able to take pre-fill bottles in with you or at least get the messaging right if you are already allowed to do that.

Toilet queues were quite bad around the bag drop tents and by the corrals, I waited in line over 30mins towards the end and by the time I came out, that line was double what it was when I joined so god knows how long they were waiting for.

The path down to the corrals is quite narrow with toilet queues blocking part of the path, this meant it took a lot longer than planned to get down to corral C so make sure to give yourself enough time to get in and avoid that stress missing the corral closure.

Chicago Marathon 2024 – 3:22:51

I was going into this one with no real goal time given the injuries, it was more a case of getting around and doing what needs to be done. I had an idea of running 7:20/mi like I did during the Berlin Marathon 2 weeks ago, taking it nice and steady like that paid off with a great race experience.

 Mile 1 – 7: 6:52, 6:55, 6:04, 7:17, 6:51, 6:52, 7:04

So that idea of a nice steady 7:20/mi pace didn’t really happen, at least not for the first half of the race. The first mile is tricky to pace as its very busy and part of that mile is through a tunnel under the tall builds so GPS is way out. GPS isn’t that accurate at all until around mile 4 or 5 so the pace was up and down quite a lot at the start but once out of the city I settled into a consistent 6:50-7:10 pace.

In the back of my mind I was thinking that maybe this was too quick given the missed training but it felt ok early on. Rookie mistake there but also in the back of my mind was the 2024 London Marathon where I ran 2:57, 6 days after Boston and all that happened there, so I had the experience of running marathons close together and running better in the second race.

The difference back then was I had a really good strong training block behind me, that wasn’t the case here but I got dragged into thinking maybe I could run around 3:05 today.

Mile 8 – 14: 6:57, 7:05, 7:06, 7:08, 7:06, 7:11, 7:46

I continued with my updated ambition to run 3:05 all the way through to the half way point. I went through half way in 1:32.50, a solid 3mins faster than ran in Berlin. Up to that point I had felt pretty good but the lack of long training was catching up with me.

My heart rate has been unusually high since Berlin and that continued through that first half. Typically if I run a marathon at sub 3 pace my heart rate is in the high 140’s/low 150’s but even running at 3:05 pace today, it was low 160’s. That took it’s toll and wore me down.

My groin had felt ok for the most part but was starting to ache quite a bit more than at any point during Berlin and more than recent weeks.

At mile 14 I tried a toilet break to see if that would reduce the pressure on the groin but it had no effect.

Mile 15 – 21: 7:51, 7:30, 8:28, 7:41, 7:45, 8:23, 8:43

With the groin starting to ache more and more as the miles went by, I made the decision to not try and push through that pain and try to hold my pace. I decided to start to slow the pace to make sure I could make it through to the finish. The last thing I wanted to do was risk a DNF.

At mile 17 I stopped and stretched out the left hamstring and hip to try to help things, it kinda helped a little but no magic touch clearing the pain. At the end of mile 20 I stopped off at the Med Tent to get some Biofreeze to put not he groin then walked through the next aid station to give it some time to kick in.

Mile 22 – 26.2: 7:49, 9:19, 8:18, 9:52, 8:28, 9:06

The Biofreeze did help to mask some of the groin pain but by now I was also feeling the effects of running too fast early one, and paying for it. It was a struggle to run 8min pace without sending the heart rate through the roof so I opted for a run walk strategy through to the finish to manage the heart rate.

I came in with no pace goal so there was no pressure on pushing hard to get sub 3:15 or 3:20 today, just do what needs to be done to get across the finish line.

After walking up that little hill before turning on to the finish straight, it was a relief to see the finish line but I had nothing in the legs to even pick up the pace for those last 200m. I crossed the line in 3:22.51 which is 32min off that original sub 2:50 goal but that was never on the cards anyway. Today’s time with an injury and walking for a bit was actually 18min faster than the time I ran in 2018 so some signs of progress there.

Brief roundup:

I came into today with an injury that most people wouldn’t have run with. I took the pressure off time wise but still went out way too hot for the training I had done in the build up to race day and I paid for that first half.

Despite the slow second half I still set a Chicago PB so that is something I am really happy with.

I can now take some time off to let the body recover from both autumn marathons and more importantly, allow the groin to heal up and the neck and back injury from Boston time to recover before building the running back up in 2025. A comeback will be on the cards but the priority for now is recovery and rehab.

I loved my time in Chicago once again and will definitely return for another marathon or maybe the half one year.