I’m officially a marathoner. How does it feel you ask? Like death. Like awesome, awesome death. Now that I am some-what alive again I’ll tell you all about it.
We got on the train at the time we wanted too, but people kept running up and stopping it so by the time we left we were over 20 minutes behind schedule. I wanted to have time to pee and check stuff out. I got there minutes before the opening ceremonies and the lines were at least 30 minutes long for the bathroom so I decided to wait for the first aid station. I looked around and saw tons of people wearing Vibrams. I was so excited!!
1-5 I felt fabulous!! My lungs felt good, I was laughing. I was finally doing it!! Every aid station had lines for the bathrooms though, so I decided to skip it. I started to feel blisters around mile 5, but it wasn’t a big deal.
At mile seven I felt them burst. It stung a little, but blisters are nothing. I did notice that I slowed down though.
At mile eight I looked down to see the red blood stains on my shoes. I had bled through them and I could feel the blood pooling in my shoes. It still wasn’t bothering me much, but I was looking for somewhere to pee. There were a lot of bushes and trees around. So tempting.
At mile thirteen, for the first time in my life, I wished for a penis. Why were there men waiting in line at the porta potties in the woods? Hello!! You can pee standing up, which means you need very little to hide your junk. Do it.
Around mile fourteen I saw a construction site with a bathroom and nobody was using it. Score. I was back on the road within two minutes.
At mile fifteen it started to downpour. It felt awesome!! But I noticed that I really started to slow down. I would push myself, feel like I was flying and check my Garmin only to see a ten minute pace.
At seventeen my capris rode and I bent over to grab the ankles and pull them down. I got told I have a heart-shaped booty. Twice.
At nineteen the sun came out and dried up all the rain sweat on my skin. For the first time in my life I really chaffed. I don’t mean the little bit I get from my bra. I mean I ripped my armpits open. I felt like I was flying and looked down to see 13 minute pace.
At mile twenty I was not happy and my blisters were really starting to affect me. At times I was at a 16 minute pace.
At twenty-one all I could think was I couldn’t wait to do this again. Then I dropped my last shot block. I ate it. Rocks and all. Judge me.
At twenty-two there was the temptation station. A big sign that said, “Anybody can run a marathon sober. Just screw it!” followed by the Nike check. What did they have? Shots of tequila. I would have died right there on the pavement if I had done a shot, but it did make me smile. I realized I needed to keep smiling and entertain myself so for two miles I sang. Outloud. To myself. And to some guy who looked like he was struggling. Best motivation song ever… New Radical, “You Get What You Give.” “We’ve got the dreamers disease,” “Don’t give up, you’ve got a reason to live,” “Four a.m. we ran a miracle mile.” That was on repeat for the entire remainder of the marathon.
Miles 24-26. My goal was four hours. I packed four hours of shot blocks. Along with being a genius, I am also diabetic. My blood sugar got low, I got dizzy, and my other personality that is caused by low blood sugar came out. I call her Crazy Bitch. Don’t tell her though. She is scary. I was FURIOUS. Not that it took me an hour longer because of the blisters, not because I should have planned better and brought more shot blocks, not because I was in pain. No reason other than I was just pist.
26-26.2 I was ready to be done. I sped up real fast to finish the .2 which of course had cobble stones. My blisters loved it. Jamie ran that last bit with me and I stopped after we crossed the first mat. Then she told me that wasn’t the finish and there were two more twenty feet away so I sped up again.
Immediately after finishing I inhaled two cookies. When my blood sugar still wasn’t high enough I inhaled two more. Then I took my shoes off and about died. There was no way those shoes were going back on so we headed to the medic tent where they gauzed and wrapped my feet. Blue coband is a new style, I promise. On the way home we stopped at McDonald’s to use the bathroom and Jamie tried to make me eat. I choked down two chicken nuggets before giving up on life and crawling to the car.
I wanted to throw up the whole way home. I took a nice hot bath, slept for half an hour, took another hot bath and then we had a family emergency so we were in the ER until midnight. I planned on waking up feeling like death. I woke up hurting everywhere, but my fever and nausea was gone. I can deal with physical pain. I will take a good stabbing before I’d ever agree to deal with nausea. It is the worst kind of pain in the world to me.
I loved my Garmin. I drive myself a little crazy with it though, because I check it too much and it’s just as bad as watching the time on the treadmill. I also got this really pretty, elegant feature from my mom where my wrist bones poke out really far, causing people to ask me what happened to them. Ever seen Napolean Dynamite? “Do these birds have large talons??” My mom’s friend started calling her wrist bones talons, and that is what we have called them ever since. Apparently I need to wear my Garmin higher on my wrist because OMG it bruised the bone in my talon. That thing hurts so bad!!
I have gotten a lot of negative comments about my Vibrams because of the blisters, but it was not the shoes. It was the hip injury. Not running for four weeks before the marathon caused all my callouses to disappear and that is why I blistered. My feet just weren’t used to running by then. That being said, I probably won’t run another in Vibrams, but not because of the blisters. Something is wrong with my foot. I can’t put any weight on it, something is grinding inside of it, and my ankle and foot are very swollen and black and blue. My work shoes are very loose because I’m too lazy to tie my shoes every day. Today my right foot barely fits in it. I hope it’s just sore, but I think I might have a stress fracture right in front of my heel.
I learned a lot from this. I learned that even though I would have done great four weeks ago, taking four weeks off just doesn’t cut it. I probably shouldn’t have ran after doing that. My body was NOT ready. I didn’t meet my goal. I didn’t do nearly as well as I wanted. I am not proud of my time, but I AM proud of myself. I finished. I did my best. I was miserable and I didn’t give up. My official time was 5:15:20. 1:15:20 longer than I wanted. Pace 12:02. 69th of 81 in my division. 1,064th of 1,197. 411th female of 478. 2:17:05 at the half. 10:07 pace in the first half. I slowed down A LOT. My splits were all over the place. I’ll have to download them from my Garmin and post them tomorrow. Splits and pictures. I didn’t do as well as I wanted. But I know what to aim for next time. I know what to do differently next time. There WILL be a next time, and I WILL do better.
Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning to run in the rain. 