I want a do-over. Not any time soon, mind you. But that was pretty much a waste of good marathon.
It was a wonderful marathon course. Really wonderful. And I got to share some time before and after the race with friends. But the fun-o-meter tanked early. And hard. More on this in a moment...
Jefferey & Carolyn, spending some time with you guys and seeing you do well was a huge lift for me and will be the one of the things I remember most fondly about this race. Also present were a couple of runners from my running club. We actually got coordinated enough to have dinner together yesterday, 10 folks total with added family members. Great fun.
A few days ago we all expected cool, wet weather, the angels sang down on me, and all was well. But the day dawned with blue skies and bright sunshine. Dang. But everything was copacetic for the first quarter of the race.
By halfway, I was struggling a bit, but still on a good pace. By 16 I was nauseous and slowing. (Nausea is a typical heat reaction for me.) By 18 I had a blister. I don't think I've ever had a blister in a marathon (one in a half-m last summer).
Somewhere around mile 20 I was slowing enough to be sending distress messages to Mr. Sno & SnoFlake on my iPhone. Somewhere around mile 23, I threw up. Overwhelmed by self pity, I cried a little then pulled myself together. After that, I was just hanging on and trying to keep moving forward.
Course description: The first 4-5 miles feature a lot of ups and downs. Nothing too horrible, and the temperature was still tolerable at that point. I planned to run a couple of 10 minute miles, then a couple of 9:30s, then go to 9:00-9:10s once we flattened out. All 5 of these miles were around 9:30 though.
A stretch of road in mile 4 was being re-paved, so we had an unpleasant couple of minutes of gravel. A big hill right after the mile 4 marker was early enough that I tried to just keep an even effort and forget about the pace. From around mile 6 to maybe 9 there was quite a bit of shade and I was hitting most of my miles very close to 9:00, with one under 9! I was walking 15-20 seconds through each water stop, drinking one cup and pouring a second on myself. Took salt pills and Nuun from mile 10 on.
I was at 2:03 at mile 13. Not ideal, but not bad. The course has a turn around at mile 15, that turned out to be far enough past 15 to mess with my mind a bit. All the way from 13 to 15, I kept thinking we were going slightly up hill, but at the turn around I found it was an illusion. :(
At 16, we were headed "home" and things started to fall apart. The sun felt so very hot. I sat down somewhere around mile 20 to add vaseline to my blistering foot, which may have saved the rest of my race from becoming a total death march. In a way, it's amazing I came in when I did considering the puking, the pain, and the general discouragement.
The hill at mile 25-26, about which I worried in my comments section yesterday, was surprisingly manageable. For sure, I slowed way down, but in my condition I expected I'd have to walk it, which I did not. The last .2 goes flat and then down steeply, and my legs did fine on that. I felt like I was limping, favoring the foot with the blister, but Mr. Sno says I looked strong. What a great guy.
I'm sorry about the negative report, and the negative results. If good friends and a desire to make people proud of me could work miracles, I would have a BQ to share instead of a blister and a bunch of tears. But for someone who hasn't trained much in any temps over 55 for 9 months, 70s (in the sun - 60s in the shade) was just too much for me.
After the marathon, Carolyn's family and mine had lunch together, then spent the afternoon walking/hobbling around the beautiful Yaquina Head Lighthouse and Museum. Being by the sea is very soothing and helps put things into perspective. Huge thanks to my friends, and my wonderfully supportive family. Newport Marathon, I'll see you again. | 