Xiamen Marathon live stream

I thought I posted something after the race but it's not here so maybe NZRun blocks China IPs as payback for China blocking Twitter and Facebook!

The course was an out and back and the majority is along a coastal road. There is a pretty consistent NE wind (around 10mph on the day which was a bit lighter than most of the preceding days) which means the first 6km has a tail wind (and somewhat for the next 5km as the wind curves around the bottom of the island). Also, there are a few ups and downs in the first 12km. So going out is much easier than coming back.
My race turned out to be a bit of a disaster. I started off at a reasonably comfortable pace and was just under 70 at the halfway mark. Given the easier first half I was expecting quite a bit quicker than this but once I was running I settled into a pace that seemed comfortable. My heart rate was a bit higher than I would have expected for the pace but luckily I wasn't pushing harder than I should and I was keeping around/below my usual marathon HR. By 15km I could feel my quads getting tighter which was rather early and perhaps a consequence of coming down some of the hills. I went through halfway in just under 70 and then had to start working a little harder to keep 2:20 pace. As each km passed I was slowly drifting off the pace. I got to 30km at around 2:21/2:22 target time but this is where the wheels well and truly came off. I started running 4 minute kms and there was nothing I could do to run faster as my legs wouldn't let me. By now they were pretty sore and my stride was about as short as a midget's! The next 12km were the hardest part of the course (hills and wind) and they were pretty tough. If I wasn't running for position then I'm pretty sure I would have dropped out (would have been my first time in a race ever!) as my legs were in agony and I was running so slowly. I had to keep going as I held the slimmest of slimmest chances that I could still finish in the top 10, besides, no one had passed me yet so I wasn't losing positions. It must have been about 35km before someone finally passed me but the same logic applied and I had to keep going. In the end, I crossed the line in 2:31:24 and was 20th.
I'm yet to find an answer as to why things went bad. There are many factors that could have played a part (time zone change, travel, diet to name a few) but when things go wrong so early it makes it harder to decipher. It's a real shame my legs didn't want to play as a top 10 was there for the taking on the day. 9th place came home in 2:12 and 10th place was 10 minutes later in 2:22. It was a bit of a long shot to go for the top 10 placing in the hope that it would help my case (given the selection policy says top 10 in a Gold label marathon is the A standard equivalent) but then I'm not sure how much weight a 2:2x top 10 placing would actually hold. I guess I'll never know!
My next task is to sort out my quad problems as they are slowing me down. In Berlin they started tightening around 30km but obviously in Xiamen it was much earlier. Anyone ever have similar issues or thoughts on fixing this? It's probably related to my running style (quads doing too much work due to various reasons) so a few small biomechanical tweaks should hopefully help, as risky as changing things may be!