Believe to Achieve

This run is bordering on insanity.  Please keep comments of insanity to yourself.  I was only going to run 10 miles today.  I awoke at 520am and my legs could feel the swelling of two shifts after an awesome week of running last week.  So I went back to bed at 6:20am still exhausted even though I went to bed at 8pm last night.  There was A LOT of scented hair spray and perfume the last two days and they usually either give me burning nerve pain (which I got, but minimally) or extreme fatigue even if I sleep forever.  Which I tried to.  Waking at 230am the other night didn't help.  But who is counting that?  It was all in the name of a good time with Kelli.  So after fifteen minutes of tossing and turning I decided to get out the door for MY 10 MILER.  Really, that is what I was going to run.  Just 10 miles.  I took a sip of water and I was out the door.  I had it in my head to run the course from Saturday to five miles but starting at my house.  It turns out I am 1.12 miles from the course.  So when I got to where I remember the three mile mark was I looked at my garmin.  I was only .4 miles behind the course.  So I kept running and thinking wow this run seems too short.  I approached the mouth of the canyon, headwind and all and thought why not continue on a little further?  I was going so slowly I felt so good.  My first mile was a 9:26 (UPHILL).  Kelli and I ran 8:45 for the first mile of Sat's run with that lovely climb by the temple.  The hill I climbed by my house was shorter BUT steeper (1300 north)  and is a gradual climb until that point  but it is the shortest way to the course.  Well....As I got into the canyon (SANS music SANS  gatorade/electrolytes  Sans FUEL and having left my house at 6:42am the humidity was RIDICULOUS-- 76%, just looked it up!!) I had the ludicrous notion to keep going to where I had parked my car Saturday and turn around and finish the dang Sogonapmit Marathon from that point.  Well..... I felt so good that I just kept going to the top.  When I got to the top I had to add on .4 miles to get to 13.1 exactly.  LUCKILY my GARMIN GAVE ME NO TROUBLE on this run.  It picked up the whole time thankfully.  No beeps or anything : D.    Adding on however added on ADDITIONAL climbing towards Granite Flats Campground.  Why EVER do they call that Campground Granite Flats? FREAKIN give me some OXYGEN that CLIMB is a killer.  Worse than the climb just before the reservoir.  HELL--O.  So I turn around and think "oh boy, I could really use some SUGAR."  I had taken One pee stop on the way up at mile 4, and three water stops (two on the trail and one at Timp Caves).  I NEVER STOPPED my watch.  I am trying to not watch the watch.  I made it to the turn around at almost 1:56.  My watch said 1:55 and switched to 1:56 just after turning.  So slightly slower than Saturday, but hey this was an impromtu marathon.  It just kept playing out in my head with each additonal mile.  Totally UNPLANNED.  I am insane.  As I descended I was getting super thirsty and was in desperate need for ELECTROLYTES and GU or some food.  Whatever.  But the clean up was so good there was almost no trace there were people opening gus along the course.   I was hoping for an un-opened one.  No such luck.  I could not pick it up very well but I didn't care.  I was the one and only runner in the EILUJ Marathon.  I was going to win no matter what : D.  You can laugh here.   The best part about the run was that I remembered a water bottle I dropped here just after UVM marathon almost two months ago.  I had hid it and there it was.  Still over half filled and COLD.  AMEN.  A miracle.  I had stopped at the top for water just before furthering my climb.  There was a faucet next to the potties.  YAY.  And now I had this water bottle.  I carried it for 4 miles.  I stopped a total of 7 times.  6 water stops, 1 pee break.  As I neared my home I eyed the reservoir.  I so wanted a dip in that but I had 1.5 miles to go.  I couldn't quit now.  So I trudged along thinking about how insane I have become.  I mean should I really even post this run?  Why not.  We are all runners.  MOST of us are insane.  Hopefully I am understood.  It was truly hard at work after NOT completing the run the other day when I felt so AWESOME.  Today I felt great going up but at the turn around I could tell it was not going to be easy without fuel.  Some MINOR problems about impromptu marathons:  No one out there knows you are running it, so no cheers no "go Julie".  Nothing.  Also running 26.2 miles when you were going to just run 10 becomes  clear that you MIGHT be crazy.  Third, an impromptu marathon makes options for fuel along the way to ZILCH, except water.  In this crazy heat and humidity this only incriminates me more about my mental status.  My skin was DRIPPING sweat from every pore.  And I was SOOOO sticky.  Yuck.    Forth, I had NO tape set up to run through at the end.    Hey, I won my first marathon and no TAPE!!!  I didn't even sprint to the finish.  I just moseyed along toward my house.  I did treat myself with a PURPLE GATORADE from my garage refridgerator.  Ahhhh!!!  I took in about 28 ounces of a 32 ouncer.  MAN did that feel/taste good.  SO REFRESHING.  I must have needed it because it didn't make me sick at all.  About 10 minutes later I drove to Grove Creek and iced myself in the river.  I slowly broke the news to my husband.  He was shocked, but not surprised.  He is used to me after all.  AP 8:10 for 26.2 GLORIOUS miles, 7 stops, no clock stops, no miles below 7:10 pace.  In fact there was only one 7:10 and two 7:12s and the rest were  under 7:23, mostly 7:25 to 7:38 on the way down, except for three really slow miles.   When Kelli, Steve and I turned around I remember we did  almost two miles at 7:18 (before I had to drive off)  and I was gaining speed.  This time my legs weren't having any of that.  They were left on Saturday's run. I ran slowly-- 7:50 after the turn around  with that steeper downhill, then a 7:57, 7:42.  Obviously I was a bit more fatigued. Plus my lower back was hurting quite a bit radiating to both my hamstrings (sciatica).  A little too much down hill running.  No hurting going up.  Downhill the problem.  But NO DNF : D.