After four months of training, whining, and turning down way too many happy hours, I finally got to run the marathon last weekend! The race was in Columbus, which meant I had to pack three bags filled with every piece of running gear I own as well as all the stuff for my pre-race rituals:
- Three water bottles with Orange Gatorade powder. Orange Gatorade is NOT my favorite but I had it before the Flying Pig half and now I refuse to drink anything else before a race. Two bottles are for the day before and the other is for the morning of.
- My canister of oatmeal. I don’t really like this either but it’s what I always eat before a race or long training run. AND, our hotel had a coffee maker, which meant I got to enjoy actual oatmeal versus taking shots of raw oats floating in lukewarm water.
The weekend itself was a blur. Saturday night we had a pre-race meeting with all of our Running Spot coaches. By this point I was a nervous wreck, still debating the 4:00 vs. 4:15 finish time. I cornered the 4:00 coach and had a small (possibly medium sized) meltdown about pacing. He convinced me to start with the Running Spot 4:00 group, running the first 13 miles with people I knew, then doing a gut check at the half point. If I felt good, I could shoot for a 4:00. If not, I could back off. Sounded like a reasonable plan.
The group met again the next morning an hour before race time to take a photo and walk over to the start line together. The starting area was a ZOO, and of course by the time I found the 4:00 zone I had lost my group (amazing, because my coach was wearing a lumberjack flannel shirt and short shorts – how do you lose someone dressed like that??). Augh.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment