26.2 miles and still standing

What a day! I crossed the finish line with a time of 4:13:23. I'm very satisfied with that number. Even better, I can still walk! Although a couple of toenails may have to be sacraficed. A small price to pay. I'm stiff and sore in the hips and knees but other than that I feel pretty good.

It was cold. In fact, at the water stations that were in the shade they had the problem that ice was forming on the pavement. That made for some fun. And at the start it was too cold for the airhorn to work. But the Sun was out and the wind wasn't too bad. I never felt the urge to take off my gloves or hat so it wasn't that warm but it was OK.

I got to see my family at miles 6 and 13.1, which was such a boost. I never had to walk any part of the race (I walked through the drink stations but that was planned - I'm just not talented enough to run while drinking from a dixie cup without most of it going up my nose). The finish was amazing with so many people cheering for those last 0.2 miles. It was a really great race.

And now I'm off for a celebratory dinner and some ibuprofen.

Race day - 5am

Last night my 3-year-old daughter gave me some race day advice. She said "Tomorrow, Mommy, run very, very fast."

I'll do my best, sweatheart. I'll do my best.

T-9 hours and counting...

I'm about to head for bed. I was planning to already be in bed by now but, well, see my post from a couple of days ago. So I'm laying out everything for tomorrow - clothes, energy gel, race bib - and trying to make sure I don't forget anything really important (like toilet paper for the porta-potties!). I carbo loaded with a huge dinner of pasta and bread. I will hopefully get some decent sleep tonight.

The time has come for me to thank all of the people who have supported me and helped me get to this point. First and foremost is my family who put up with all of the time I had to spend out on the pavement - which often took up a large chunk of a Saturday morning or afternoon - instead of spending it with them. I'm grateful for the family and friends who have repeatedly told me that they know I can do this, even when I was doubting myself. I know many of them would be at the finish line to cheer for me if they could and that they will be with me in spirit tomorrow. That thought will keep me going when the going gets tough.

I'll be posting tomorrow once I get home. Now I'm off to bed.

Cold as ice

I'm looking at the forecast for Sunday. It still looks cold. The high is predicted to be 39 for the day. That might not sound bad but first you have to realize that the high will be at 3 or 4 in the afternoon, long after the race is over. Secondly, you have to look at the "feels like" temps on weather.com. Right now it predicts that at 6am (the race starts at 7) it will feel like 19 degrees. That's a little cold. At noon it will feel like a balmy 29 degrees. Yea? I guess I can at least count on being wide awake, even if I don't get much sleep between now and then. Not much chance of feeling sleepy when you're standing around in 19 degree weather.

I'm supposed to do a 20 minute run tomorrow in even colder weather. The "feels like" temps for the entire day tomorrow never get above 23. That's because they're predicting a wind. Lovely. I know, I should try to be positive about it. There's that old saying... what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Honestly, I think what doesn't kill you just leaves you horribly maimed and disfigured wishing you were dead, but then what do I know?

Life goes on

I will be the first to admit that I can be a little self-centered. When people ask what I've got planned for the weekend my first thought is "How can they not know that I'm running a marathon on Sunday?!?!" Ok, maybe they haven't kept up with the blog. But this thing - this running thing - has taken up a good fraction of my time and energy for the past 4 months and it all culminates in a race that's only 3 days away. So you'll have to excuse me if I'm a little bit preoccupied by it.

What I've come to realize is that the rest of the world doesn't really care that in a few short days I'll be attempting one of the greatest challenges of my life. Papers still need to be graded. Work emergencies still require my attention. Kids still call for Mommy in the middle of the night. Laundry still has to be done. The stress still piles up. Life goes on... and it doesn't cut me any slack just because I foolishly signed up to run 26.2 miles on Sunday.

I haven't felt very good about any of my runs this week. I feel tired. A lot. Now, it's true that I haven't been sleeping well so it might be expected that I'm not overly energetic, but these runs have been short ones. I should be able to do these runs without even breathing hard. And while I do run them at a good pace they seem far too difficult. I feel as though I have no energy. Unfortunately I think it's a result of being taxed on all fronts - mentally, physically and emotionally. While following my training program has prepared me physically and the tapering I've been doing should be allowing my legs to rest up for the big event, there's nothing in the program about how to taper the other aspects of life so that you're mentally and emotionlly rested as well. In fact, I believe the point I was making in the previous paragraph is that there is no way to taper life. I try to keep it to a controlled chaos and that's the best I can do.

So with 3 days left to go I'm feeling very weary. Not exactly the state I had hoped to be in at this point. Friends reassure me that I'll be fine, I can do this, I'll finish the race. I hope they're right. While I believe that, since I've done the training, I'm physically prepared I also know that my mental state plays a big role, too. Who knows... maybe this is all just pre-race jitters. Maybe I just need a good night's sleep. Maybe by Sunday morning I'll be champing at the bit to get out there. I sure hope so.

Important Final Confirmation

That was the subject of the e-mail I got today from the organizers of the marathon. I've got a bib number (7227, in case you were wondering), an estimated finish time, and a T-shirt size. It doesn't get much more official than that. This was all very reassuring because when I went to check my registration this weekend I had a small heart attack when the search came back saying that it had no record of me. After a couple more attempts I realized the problem was that I had put my first name in the "last name" slot and vice versa. You know, they don't give out those PhD's to just anyone.

I had a short 30-minute run around campus today. It feels weird to be running so little. I feel restless. It was a good run, though, with 8:40 splits. The temperature was chilly at 40 degrees. Meanwhile, the weather forecast for the race is growing worse by the day. The expected high is now 38 degrees. Crap. And this is coming off of an overnight low of 26. Obviously this might change between now and Sunday but I think the bottom line is that it's going to be cold. It could be worse. It could snow.

Things I Have Learned (Part VI)

1. Worms are slippery.
2. Sometimes a 6-mile run can seem long even when you've proven that you can do 20 miles.
3. It's amazing how a little thunder and lightning can improve my split time.
4. iPod + rain = not so good.

Another rest day?

Today is a rest day. Or should I say, another rest day. It feels weird to have so many off days. And the days I am running or cross training I'm doing much less. I'm in the tapering part of the training and it just feels odd. Sometimes I panic and think "What am I doing?! I have to run 26.2 miles next Sunday!! I should be out there running every day!!!" But the experts know what they're talking about. I did this tapering for the half-marathon last year and it worked just fine. I trust in the program. It's just hard to fight the urge to run farther or more often. I feel restless. Today I rest. My "long" run on Saturday is 6 miles. That will take me less than an hour to do. After that my next long run will be the race - all 26.2 miles of it.

Two weeks and counting

Ok, I'm getting nervous. I'm not too proud to admit it. In two weeks I'll be running 26.2 miles. Or at least trying to. When I think about it, really think about it, I know I can do it. I know I can finish. But then I realize it's more than that. I don't just want to finish... I want to finish well. I think I said this exact thing last year before the half (and if I weren't so lazy I'd look back at those posts and verify that). Half of the course I've done before, since the half marathon is simply the first half of the full course. There is supposedly a not-so-nice hill on the second half of the course somewhere. I think this is what scares me most of all. I'm not familiar with that part of the city so I have no idea what this hill is like. I'd feel more comfortable knowing the lay of the land, knowing how much energy I should be reserving for that hill. I suppose this is one of those parallels with life... you don't always know what's coming up so you just have to do the best you can when you get there. And I will, of course. But I'm still nervous.

The big 2-0

Well, I did it. I ran 20 miles today. How did it go? Let's just say, it wasn't easy. In fact, in the last two miles I wanted to stop and walk so many times I lost count. But I never did. I was checking my pedometer every 20 seconds to see how much further I had to go, disappointed each time that the number was still so large, but I kept on going. Sort of like a half dead, hallucinating energier bunny. Now that's a nice image.

I'm a bit sore from the run but surprisingly not as sore as I was when I did 18 miles a couple of weeks ago. Still, it's a bit sad when you have to actually use your hands to help lift your leg up on to the couch. Nothing a little ibuprofen and rest won't fix. I'd kill for a hot tub right now.

Now the tapering starts. Next Saturday my long run is only 10 miles. The week after that it's down to 6. A week later it's race day. I still don't see how I'm going to make the jump from 20 miles to 26.2 miles but I guess I'll just jump off that bridge when I get to it. Based on today's run I think it's safe to say that, if I manage to cross the finish line, I'm not going to be one of those people smiling and waving their arms and jumping around. I'll just be trying to remain upright.