{"id":3978,"date":"2013-12-08T20:43:31","date_gmt":"2013-12-08T20:43:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/?p=3978"},"modified":"2020-05-26T08:26:06","modified_gmt":"2020-05-26T14:26:06","slug":"space-coast-marathon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/2013\/12\/08\/space-coast-marathon\/","title":{"rendered":"Space Coast Marathon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Holy wow, I have a lot to catch up on – but first thing’s first, let’s recap this marathon, shall we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Before:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taper took an interesting turn.  My runs were fantastic the week before, to the point where it made me a little worried because normally everything goes to shit.  My last run, a 5 miler with 3 at marathon pace, went so smoothly it was scary.  Then, the normal taper crap started to settle in, and since it was so late in the week, it was REALLY scary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thursday, I only ate one big meal and one plate of deserts.  This made my body just a little off.  I also made the mistake of wearing boots instead of more reasonable shoes.  I didn’t figure I would be on my feet much, but I guess it was enough that my feet were cranky after that day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friday, due to long security lines and being dumb, all I had was some beef jerky and airplane snax until about 6pm.  After eating a giant (and pretty unhealthy) dinner and a large beer, and heading to the hotel room, I was convinced I was getting sick.  I slept incredibly fitfully.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saturday, my ankle hurt after my 1.5 mile shakeout run, so much so that I was really worried that I’d not be able to start the race.  Zliten kept being all excited, and all I could do was hope he wouldn’t have to race without me.  Around 9pm though, I figured the best thing I could do was shut my brain off, sleep as long as possible, and let my ankle knit itself back together.  And I did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sunday, race morning, I woke up, put my compression sox and shoes on before I left my bed, and touched my toes down… still cranky, but much less so.  I would start, at least, I knew that.  I got my bar down and munched on some cereal, skipped my normal starbux (just didn’t seem like it would set well).  We got there, poo’d, walked around, watched the half marathoners start, poo’d again, walked around, and then got in our corrals.  My husband was starting with the 5-hour folk, and I filed in next to the 4:40 pacer, and then we were off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Good: Mile 1-10<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I walked as long as humanly possible.  I didn’t want to feel the hurt any longer than I had to, if I was going to.  Finally, I was about to get trampled if I didn’t, so gingerly I tried and *cue angels singing* my foot was ok.  I thanked the running deities or whatever higher power is up there looking out for babies and drunks and idiot marathoners a lot in the first mile, which ticked over in around 10:35 – under marathon pace, but not too much so to worry me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you remember, I had to pick the strategy<\/a> of following the pacer, watching my watch, or running by feels.  Well, the pace bunny took off a little too fast (he was wayyy ahead of me even though I was running under 10:41s), and while my ankle seemed like it was going to hold, my body was definitely a little *off*, so running by feels meant I slipped to around 11s.  So, early on, it was watch-nazing, and trying to keep that pace group in my sights and not let the next one (4:45) catch me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the turn around, I saw Zliten just a bit behind me, and looking good.  One quarter done.  Right on pace.  Let’s do this.  Hopefully all these niggles work their way out for a while.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I finished mile 10 still on pace, but the hurt never got better.  I wasn’t feeling as if I was pushing the pace too much, it felt just fine aerobically, but I think my gait was just a little off, so that made things ache differently.  I also really regretted having my handheld because it annoyed me from mile 1, and I was barely even drinking out of it, the temps were good and the aid stations were plentiful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Bad: Mile 11-15<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was hoping to get my second wind, but passing mile 10 just made me mentally implode a bit, 16 more to go and I was already in pain.  I kept going as fast as I could, but I was seeing more 11’s when I looked down instead of 10s, and picking up the pace was harder.  I passed 13.1 exactly on pace (2:20), but just after the mat I pulled over to the side, stopped and stretched out my aching back of my legs, and then tried walking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, the good news is that walking didn’t feel ANY better, so I picked it up again.  Around mile 14, I decided to ditch my water bottle and was struggling with getting it out of the holder, and who pulls up right by me?  Zliten!  He helped me get it out and carried it (I told him to ditch it but he held it anyway).  I was REALLY REALLY in a hole then, and was convinced I’d busted my goal down to JUST FINISH SO I GET THE DAMN TOWEL AND MEDAL.  I might have done worse if he hadn’t shown up.  He was having fun, enjoying himself, talking to people, having smiles for the both of us, while I tried to not cry and grunted and followed him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, somewhere in there, my mp3 player decided to default to random on my playlist and cut my volume in half, and I couldn’t fix it.  Super annoying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Ugly: Mile 16-20<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, I had to stop and stretch, I told Zliten I would catch up with him.  I stretched, walked for about .05 of a mile, and then got running again.  And I did catch him, and decided that I could make it a mile before I had to do that again.  When my watch dinged 17, I did the same thing, and 18, and 19.  These miles were slow, but I was moving forward and as I got closer to 20, my mood improved.  As we hit the last turnaround, and then the 20 mile split mat, Zliten had to stop and stretch, finally, I started feeling better and getting that second wind I was waiting on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He happened to mention that we needed to pick it up if we were going to make sub-5 hours, and I asked if it was ok if I ran ahead, he said yeah, and I went.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Awesome: Mile 21-26.2<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Something clicked in me that I wanted to get in sub-5 more than I wanted to not hurt.  So, I took off, running as fast as I could reasonably at that point (11s) and asked myself if I could make it 2 miles without a break.  Let me tell you, if you want to feel awesome about yourself, run a ~11 minute mile pace around the 5-hour marathon finishers.  It’s a lot of people walking dejectedly.  I passed, no lie, hundreds of people in that last 10k.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I passed mile 22 and found strength for one more.  At mile 23, I felt some major cramping in the back of my body, so I stopped to stretch, walked for about .05 of a mile, and then started the 5k push to the finish.  I told myself that I could slow down for mile 24 if I needed, but I couldn’t stop, and I was just so damn ready to be done, I didn’t.  I finally picked back up to marathon pace, and the mile markers said 25, and then 26, and then I was running faster, and then I rounded the corner and saw the finish line and I was passing people, and in my mind I was sprinting like Usain Bolt and I crossed the finish line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My garmin said 4:59.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The After:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I got my medal and towel and had about 4 cups of water and then sat down the first place I found space and I think I would have cried if I had the hydration to have tears.  I told Zliten that the last 10k was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and a week out, the pain has faded, but I think that’s probably accurate.  I realized a few minutes later that I should go watch for Zliten to finish, and hoped I hadn’t missed him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I stumbled over to a little bit before the finish line and some couple took pity on me and let me sit where they were standing and I waited… and waited… and then I was about to go check with medical (he said his knee was hurting and I was lucky to have some Rx coupons<\/a> lying around) and I saw Zliten round the corner and cheered my ass off for him.\u00a0 I had put 18.5 minutes on him since I left him at mile 20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I hobbled over to find him at the finish and then we plopped down and stretched and recovered.  I finished in 5:02:35, and he finished in 5:21:07 (his goal was to at least beat my time from last year, which he did!).  I’m about 1% pissed that I couldn’t have found 2:36 in there to at least finish under 5, and 99% proud of that last 10k.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had two post race beers, and was ready to eat right away, so my tummy cooperated with me.  I didn’t eat as many of my chews as I had expected, but I took in gatorade at just about every aide station.  I might have done better if I chomped a little more in the messy middle miles, or it might have upset my stomach and I’d have done worse.  You never know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then, we went and played by the Ocean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Recovery was not so bad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Overall – I am happy with marathon #2.  It’s progress.  It’s a 21 minute PR<\/a>.  I fell apart in completely different ways and places from the first one.  It’s a distance I’m still trying to figure out, and I’m looking forward to more opportunities to do so.  I get the first part, I actually get the end now, I just need to figure out the middle.  My training cycle was awesome, and I fully believe that a 4:40 was within my grasp if everything would have gone well, but my A legs didn’t show up that day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’d love to give the distance another go sooner, than later, and I was really considering it, but after discussing with Zliten, our legs need a little bit of a break.  I think mine handled the training and the race better than his this time, but I’d rather play it safe and not immediately jump back into 40-50 miles per week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What’s next?  Well, stay tuned.<\/p>\n

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Holy wow, I have a lot to catch up on – but first thing’s first, let’s recap this marathon, shall we? The Before: Taper took an interesting turn.  My runs were fantastic the week before, to the point where it made me a little worried because normally everything goes to shit.  My last run, a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":""},"categories":[62,72],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paUhDu-12a","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3978"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3978"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12016,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3978\/revisions\/12016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adjustedreality.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}