Hartford Marathon 2025

On October 11, 2025, I ran in the 32nd Hartford Marathon. The full race FPV/POV video can be viewed on YouTube here: Hartford Marathon 2025 Race FPV/POV

Since I didn’t win the Chicago Marathon lottery for 2025, I decided to take the opportunity to check-off another state that would have conflicted in the same time period. I set my sights on Hartford since it is the biggest marathon in Connecticut and hilly. I’m trying to target more difficult courses first and save flatter/downhill races for later when I assume I will get faster to take advantage of them.

I didn’t get to the start line as healthy as I would hope for. About 3 weeks ago, I fell while running and hit my hip pretty hard on stone ground. I thought the ache/pain went away but it reappeared race week causing me concern of whether I fractured a bone or something. In addition to that, I was not sleeping well and the Apple watch was raising alarms of out-of-normal vitals which made it seem I was probably sick. So i got a twofer; I ran sick and hurt.

I purchased Bib mail-out so I did not have to worry about attending the expo. This allowed me to fly into Hartford the day before without worrying if I could get to the expo for bib pickup. And thus saved me an extra night’s stay because I would otherwise stay the night prior just to ensure I could attend the expo. Ironically, when I got into Hartford, I stopped by the expo because the convention center it was located at was along the bus route and I had ample time since it was too early to check-in to the hotel. So I could’ve saved the money on mail-out.

Travel

Nothing I found interesting happened on the way to Hartford. I was concerned about impacts of the government shutdown. I had heard of flights getting delayed but I seemed luckily unaffected. Being from Maryland, I few from BWI to BDL direct via Southwest Airlines on Oct 10. I used the CTtransit bus 30X to get from the airport into the city since it’s the cheapest option. The bus runs about every 40 minutes so you do have to wait a while if you’re unlucky.

I stayed at The Capitol Hotel by Ascend, booked via the race’s lodging partner site. There are other options like Hilton but I chose Capitol because it was closest to race start/finish for easy walking. I stayed two nights since I like to stay the night after a race because I might find myself unable to walk well after the race and need the night to get in better shape. One nice thing the hotel had that other hotels doesn’t is complimentary breakfast.

The travel home was equally uneventful, thankfully. I took the 30X bus from Union Station, next door to the hotel, to the airport Sunday morning, Oct 12, and went back to the place I came from, BWI via Southwest Airlines.

Carb Loading

Since I am a lower weight, I need fewer carbs. Since the race was Saturday, I started eating extra Wednesday morning. After each meal, I would eat one serving of hotdog bun and one serving of licorice. I did this until lunch on Friday since a bag of buns only comes with 8 buns, so at three meals a day, I run out of buns Friday lunch. I still had licorice though.

Race Day

Weather

The weather was pretty good. The start was great but it did get a bit warm as the day went on. At start around 7:53am, the temp was 49F with 46F dew point. At the finish around 12:59pm, the temp was 68F with 52F dew point.

The race start was cloudy but the sun eventually broke through so it was sunny and warm for a while but became cloudy again about 1pm.

Extra Stuff

As per usual, I was wearing my recording gear:

• GoPro Hero13 Black
• GoPro Headstrap 2.0
• GoPro Contacto
• Anker Portable Charger

The only issue that happens with wearing the GoPro is that the weight of the camera hurts my forehead after a while, so I need to figure out a solution for that, maybe extra foam pad. The headstrap does have padding where the camera is attached meets the forehead but probably too thin.

Nutrition

About one hour before the race started, I ate a serving of licorice.

Carry:

• 1x Bonk Breaker Green Apple Energy Chews
• 2x Sport Beans(R) Jelly Beans Assorted Flavors
• 4x Mott’s(R) Assorted Fruit Flavored Snacks
• LMNT (~70% of a packet mixed with water in 550mL bottle)

This is my standard marathon load out. It has served me well in prior races. I eat either 1/2 a Mott’s pack, 1/3 a Sports Beans pack, or 1/4 Bonk Breaker pack every 15 minutes. I did encounter an issue this race where I would try to eat but my body didn’t seem to want it and I had a “full” feeling, so I did skip some nutrition intervals. I don’t know if that was due to me actually taking in too much stuff already or some other issue. I guess it worked out since I didn’t throw-up and I didn’t bonk either. I try to take a sip of liquids every 10 minutes but more often than not I would sip when eating since otherwise it would be too dry.

On the course, I only took the water cups they offered, no electrolytes or gels since I carried my own. I liked the pretty frequent water stops since they are about every 2mi. There is this one stop on the course called the candy station. I took a cup thinking it was water but it was flat Coke. I took a sip but poured the rest out because I didn’t think it was wise for me to drink something I didn’t train with since I didn’t know how my body would react to it.

Race

The race starts with both the marathoners and half-marathoners together for about 8mi. This makes it very crowded at the beginning and difficult to pass. Due to my hip pain, I decided to start easy so just went with the flow. I kept to my standard race strategy of keeping to a target heart rate. This worked up to about 13mi. At that point my HR was above the target. However I decided to keep up with the pace.

The race did get a bit lonely when the half-marathoners split away, but there were always a few people around me.

After about 20mi I decided it was too risky to keep at the HR I was at since I thought I was getting symptoms of heat illness. I decided to do intervals based on running when I was below target HR and walking when it went above target HR. I did this until about 0.5mi remaining which is when I started running to the finish. It is quite a long finish line though since you still have some distance to go when you get past the arch to get to the finish line.

Before the race even started, I told myself I’d be happy just to finish because I was worried most about the hip pain that reappeared. So I am very happy that in the end I only came in about two minutes slower than my PB set at Delaware.

Some other issues encountered on the course:

• At one of the water stops, I messed up picking up the cup and think I tweaked my right knee. Later on in the race, I did develop a pain on the left side of the right knee which was causing me to slightly limp. I tried to fix it on the course but couldn’t figure out what was strained so I just had to keep going on it.
  • Some research after the race makes me think it was Saphenous nerve entrapment. I did some flossing movements I saw in videos on YouTube and that seeemd to have helped.
• My right calf started cramping on the finish stretch around where the final left turn to the arch is. I was able to keep going with it and get to the finish line without stopping though. I was going to feel so embarrassed if I stopped so close to the finish line.