However, for those of you following at home - WE DID IT! That's right. Not only did we surpass - substantially - my goal of raising $1700 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (to the tune of $2,111.80 - you guys ROCK!), but on Sunday, October 4, I ran my first consecutive 26.2 miles.
It. Was. Awesome.
What? You don't want the blow by blow? Ha. You're getting it anyways.
My friend and old college roommate Jannette came to run the marathon with me, staying the days before the race with Tony and I. It was our first marathon. Before that, I had only run a 5k; Jannette, a much more seasoned runner than I, had run half-marathons and 5ks. We were discovering this whole marathon race day thing together.
Friday, we later picked up our race packets, which includes little electronic timing "chips" that you lace into your shoes. The chips allow timing mats throughout the course to register the time you pass them - and hence figure out your pace. And of course we got our runner's bib with each of our race numbers. We also received a bag filled with coupons, flyers for running-related services and other marathons, as well as a pair of our very own Twin Cities Marathon technical socks. Sweet! We briefly wandered the race expo - tents and tents of running products, services, and even a few workshops in the St. Paul River Center - but quit early. We were warned to stay off of our feet as much as possible - and specifically not too spend too much time walking around the expo. However, we did snag some free disposable running gloves (folks often throw them on the route when they get too warm - race volunteers pick them up.) And Jannette got to meet Hal Higdon!The evening ended with a dinner with Jannette's aunt and uncle; her uncle was an experienced marathon runner. The route, hydration strategies, and related discussion were, naturally, the topic of the evening.
The day before the race, we figured out the race route and drove along it, starting from the Metrodome in Minneapolis and ending at the Capitol in St. Paul, noting the major hills along the way. (Note to self: This was such a good idea. I will do this again for any other marathon(??) I decide to run.) Many parts of the route were very familiar to me, owing to my Team In Training runs - I was better prepared than I thought!
Saturday night, I assembled my running gear. Runners are advised never to use new equipment right before a race - sound counsel. And I am not a low-maintenance runner - I have a whole fuel belt (two water bottles and a pouch for gels), a visor, sunglasses, and an arm ipod thingy. But I also had some arm warmers (little sleeves that can be pulled off easily, if I got too warm) that I needed because I knew I would be too warm in a long-sleeved technical shirt. Fortunately for me, it worked out beautifully.
Now, for the harder part. I added ribbons with names to my running shoes - several folks had contributed in the name of loved ones who fought or were fighting cancer. One was a colleague of mine in Madison (Elizabeth) who contributed in honor of another colleague (hi Sam!) who is currently fighting leukemia (and is in maintenance as of now - GO SAM!!). Finally, I added my personal honorees to my shirt - my Dad and my Aunt Mickie. A sad and yet proud moment. Finally, I added my first name on the front of my shirt, so that spectators could cheer me on. I would need it! On a much lighter note, I also discovered that I am not skilled in the ways of puffy paint (and we will leave that at that.) We had our carbo-ish dinner and ended the evening early.
Sunday, we left the house at 6:15am; Tony dutifully drove us to the Metrodome at that ungodly hour. The race started at 8am; a different 10-mile race sponsored by the Twin Cities Marathon folks started at 7am. Jannette was a lifesaver - I was almost hyperventilating. I met with my Team In Training team, and we took a group picture. Jannette and I had packed our drop bag for after the race - a jacket, socks, comfortable shoes. (You can see the drop bag on the couch, by the dog.)
After a bout of nervously tying my drop bag too tightly and ripping the draw string, then getting another bag that had accidentally been slashed by the razor opening the box (!!) we were finally able secure both bags and drop them off in the proper cannister out of the rows and rows of them. The bags would be transported to St. Paul, waiting for us at the finish line. From there, we proceeded towards the runners corral.
The weather was perfect - around 45, with the promise to warm up to around 50. Excellent running weather. As I've said before, running can make you feel almost 20 degrees warmer than the air temperature - so running in 50* can feel like 70*. Before we got started, though, it was chilly to be dressed twenty degrees cooler than it actually was - I actually put on a garbage bag, with holes cut for my head and arms, to ward off the chill. Jannette used an older long-sleeved shirt.
Now, I had no idea that the runners' corral before a race was so organized. Placards were up by the pace each runner hoped to maintain. If you were a slower runner, you went towards the back. For better or worse - sorry, all of you faster runners - Jannette and I started a little bit further up from our actual pace because we would get across the starting line more quickly. We couldn't hardly see the spectators along the chute; there were tall wire fences separating runners from the crowd. We also saw pace groups - groups lead by an experienced runner who kept a particular pace and who would finish the race at a particular finishing time - marked by the group leader carrying colorful balloons with their pace and finishing time printed in black marker, attached to a stick. There were a couple of speeches, and finally, the starting gun fired. We started to slowly move forward - some people jogging in place, others just walking forward. There were so many runners, in fact, that we didn't even cross the starting line until about 10 minutes after the gun went off.
This was it! After months of training, I was actually running the marathon! I felt great. During training, and even in August, my goal was to simply finish before the course closed (you'll remember my preoccupation with THE BUS - the bus that picked up (ate?) straggling runners who couldn't finish by the course closing time 6 hours and 15 minutes after the starting gun. As far as I was concerned, that bus was a shark, complete with toothy grin and a fin on top). Then, my IT band injury had relegated me to the pool for the last month of training. But I was doing so well in my Yasso track runs before the IT band injury, and I had rested, iced, medicated and generally was so awesome to that IT band that I decided to increase my goal just a bit - work a 12:35 run/walk pace, and complete the marathon in 5:30 (five hours, thirty minutes.)
The first mile, all of the disposable things started to come off. People who had worn an old shirt, garbage bags like myself, and gloves threw them along the route, some more careful about not throwing them in the path of their fellow runners than others. Volunteers along the route picked up the discarded clothing and trash; clothing in good shape would be donated. We ran downtown, past the Basilica and up Hennepin, then turned right up the hill. I felt so good that I had to keep checking my pace - I was running too fast. A common beginning runner mistake. But I felt so good. In fact, the first ten miles were completely flawless. I was constantly amazed at how quickly the mile markers flew by. Literally, I got to the 10 mile marker and thought to myself - "Ten miles? Already?? This is great!!"
Every couple of mile markers (I think) there was water and Powerade. I kept up a routine of Powerade at one stop, water and gel at the next, and nothing at the next, then Powerade again, and so on - enough to stay hydrated, but not so much that I would develop a gut ache from too much sugar or fluids in my stomach at once.
And the spectators! They were great. I was so worried about my first marathon, but when I signed up for Twin Cities, the Team In Training staff assured me I had made a great choice. And now I knew why. First of all - spectators were EVERYWHERE. The Twin Cities Marathon has a contest for the neighborhoods on the racecourse for who can throw the best themed party, and people were CRAZY. They dressed up in costumes. One had set up a coffee bar along the street. People offered runners bananas, candies, everything you could think of. Whole sound systems set up with music blaring was not uncommon. They didn't care if you were fast or slow. They were just so excited that you were there! And then there were the purple and green Team In Training cheer squads. I couldn't believe I was part of such a cool program.
We rounded the lakes of South Minneapolis, waved to my colleague Kate and her husband who cheered us on, and eventually headed down Minnehaha Boulevard, which wound around to River Road along the Mississippi River. I saw my in-laws and Tony there, and our family friends Al, Jen, Lisa, Liam and Anna! There was even a whole banner with my and Jannette's name on it and our bib numbers made by my mother-in-law, Carolyn. How sweet is that??? I don't think I've ever had my name on a banner!
By that time, though, I was starting to feel the distance. Crossing the river at Franklin Avenue, I passed mile marker 19. And then began the climb.
Everyone says that mile twenty is the worst in a marathon. Well, I suppose that's not exactly true - everyone has their most difficult miles in a marathon. But the ones I've heard the most about are after twenty. You see, after twenty miles, you've exceeded your longest training run. It's kind of an unknown (or it least it was for me, who had never run a marathon before.) Mississippi River Boulevard, as the river road is known on the east side of the Mississippi, gradually goes upward before it hits Summit Avenue. In fact, the rest of the race route - from about mile 19 on - is pretty much uphill. Let me say it another way: after running 19 miles of not exactly easy hills along lakes in Minneapolis, you get to run six MORE miles almost exclusively up.
Around mile twenty, my left leg started to cramp. And not cramps I had never felt before - seizing was more like it. The top of my thigh, then the bottom, then my calf. I limped to the side of the road and stretched; the muscles loosened. I made it about two more miles - mile 21 or 22 - and they seized again, much worse this time. I didn't know if I could go much further, but as luck would have it, my running coach was right there. She showed me how to physically rub out the knots in my leg. I could run a little, but I had to do much more walking. Before, I was running a steady 10:30 minutes and walking two minutes. Now... I couldn't risk it. I ran as much as I could before my legs felt like they would give, then walked some more. Ran some, walked some more. Tried to run a block at a time, a minute at a time, whatever would get me going! I saw my 5:30 pace group and kept up with them for about a mile before they pulled ahead. Turns out they finished WELL ahead of the 5:30 pace, as I finished at 5:33.
I kept limping and running and limping some more. The spectators were so encouraging - if it was possible to run on cheers alone, I would have! I was determined, though, to RUN across that finish line, and that meant my legs had to be in good enough shape to try it.
Finally, I got to the Cathedral - mile 26. The Cathedral is on top of a hill and there was only a mere two-tenths of a mile between myself and the finish line. However, after all that running hills, my quads were completely shot - I wasn't going to be running down that hill, anyway! Finally, I got to the bottom of the hill. And I saw a throng of people and the finish line.
[ABOVE: Me going across the finish line - look for the purple jersey and black pants, with the arms up. You can also see my Team In Training colleague (I think it was Nolan?), also with a purple jersey but with black shorts, just crossing the first of the final two timing mats. He finished less than a minute later.]
I entered the finishing chute - surrounded by cheering spectators - exhausted but determined to start running before the finish line. And I did, finishing with my arms above my head. In my mind they were straight in the air, but the pictures were much more funny and a little sad - bent at the elbows, level with my shoulders, with only my forearms reaching up. But that's all I could do.
I received my medal, finishers shirt, and picked up my drop bag with my sweats, fresh socks, sandals and a jacket. From there it was to the Team In Training tent, where my picture was taken, I got to congratulate my other teammates, and got a spiffy 26.2 Team In Training pin. I went to find Tony and my in-laws, and saw our friend Lisa. We waited for Jannette, who I had lost in the first mile; she had tremendous knee issues that day. After she crossed the finish line, she told us she had been battling the bus most of the way to the end. I know I couldn't have finished with a similar injury. We got bags of ice for our knees, and eventually went to go eat some extraordinarily carb-heavy comfort food.
In the days after the marathon, I was hobbling around like I was eighty. I couldn't walk down stairs more than a step at a time for three days!
The marathon, though, was something I am so glad that I did. And you all made it happen! I couldn't have gotten nearly as far without your support, your encouragement, your contributions to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's mission of helping those who battle cancer in their families and in their lives. At the risk of appearing sanctimonious, the honest truth is that I ran a marathon because I could; because unlike others, I am lucky enough to enjoy the physical health allowing me to train for an endurance race. So many others don't have that option. At the very beginning of the training program, I was convinced that the best I could hope for was finishing before the course closed. I was the kid who played sports in high school but hated the Presidential Fitness mile in gym. I thought that because I couldn't sprint for miles at a time I just wasn't destined to be a runner. But I decided to embark on this program go one day at a time, and if I got to a point where I couldn't do it... well, then I wouldn't do it. But I never got to that point.
I ran a marathon because I wanted to do something - a difficult challenge that would take discipline; something I had never done before and wasn't sure I could do - to honor the memory of my Dad and my Aunt Mickie. I ran because the folks battling cancer - those for whom several of my friends' contributions were given in honor of - were up against something much more substantial than any hill workout or track routine that my coaches could dream up (and believe me, they were creative.)
I've since completed another half marathon. In 2009, I ran over 600 miles - or the equivalent of running from St. Paul to Indianapolis, IN. I hope to complete two 5ks, two half marathons, and the Twin Cities marathon again in the coming year. It's going to be more difficult, in some ways - the first year is all about learning and new experiences. Now I have expectations, and the work gets that much more difficult. I've learned a great deal about myself, but even more about the network of folks that I have the privilege of calling my family, friends and acquaintances.
So many thank yous are due. Poor Tony had (has?) the yeoman's work of putting up with my running schedule, making running a part of our family budget, and attending those races in the early morning, among many, many other inconveniences. Thank you, sweetie. My in-laws John and Carolyn have been there for pretty much every race I've ever run, no matter what unearthly hour they start. Thank you to Jannette, who always encourages me to run, no matter how many times I fall off the wagon. And thanks to all of my friends, who offered so much encouragement when I wrote about training. Y'all are a pretty awesome bunch and I am fortunate to have you in my life. Thank you, so much, again.
Hi, I'm Erin. I am committed to not only run a marathon but set a personal goal to
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