Ok, so I have to preface this recap by saying
that, Yes, I am quite disappointed that I didn’t come in sub-5 like I had
wanted to. And, Yes, this was a hard race but in a very good way. However, I do
fully believe that I can be disappointed in not meeting my overall goal but
still be very pleased with the marathon as a whole and that is exactly how I
feel. I’ve been training for sub-5 and running with that exact intent but the
course was unexpectedly difficult, and so with that in mind I fully believe I
ran an awesome race. This race proved to me just how much this distance
intrigues me. This race gave me a sense of clarity as a runner and mostly this
race just gave me PROOF that I am in fact getting stronger as a runner. I went
into this race with having some of the best training I have ever had and I felt
stronger than I ever have and that showed on race day. If you compare this
marathon to Dallas you will see that I dropped 24 seconds per mile on this race which equates to an 11 minute PR,
sub-5 or not that’s solid! In just 5 short months I have grown a lot and Saturday
I was able to see that. But enough of all that, let’s talk race!
The race was held at the Garmin headquarters in
Olathe, Kansas and this past Saturday could not have been a more perfect day to
run a marathon. The weather was a chilly 38(ish) degrees, sunny and only a
slight breeze, beyond perfect for me. I got up early did my normal thing, had a
banana and tortilla (love my tortillas!) and mom, Rachel and I made the 4 mile
drive to the hotel. Parking was not a problem and we got there right around 6
am for the 7 am start time. My stomach was a little on edge and I’m not sure if
it was something I had eaten or nerves or just what, I didn’t really feel
nervous but either way I visited the port-o-potties a couple of times and
finally decided to just take an Imodium just in case. About 6:30 I made my way
over towards the crowds to meet up with Elizabeth {Curly Pink Runner}, we had
found out a while back that we were both running this marathon and this was her
first! We emailed back and forth and agreed to meet up and run some of the race
together. We easily found each other and took a few pictures and then made our
way to the starting line. It was nice to have someone to talk to and not be
alone at the start of the race.
After the national anthem there was a moment of
silence in honor of the Boston Marathon and I used that time to just pray for a
great day. I knew mom and Rachel were on the other side of the starting line
waiting for me to pass by and then the gun went off and we were on our way. I
easily spotted them and waved as, I was on my way to another marathon!!
The
first few miles were cold, it was shady and the sun wasn’t quite up yet and I
had tossed my jacket to Rachel. I did have my gloves but I remember my hands
being so cold they hurt for the first 2 miles. There was a sea of people but I
honestly never felt crowded at all. The week before the marathon I had spent
lots of time studying my two 20 miler runs because those went so well pace-wise
and over all so I really wanted to try and mimic those as much as I could. I
knew my first mile would probably be a little bit faster than I wanted it due
to so many people and trying to settle in so I planned to make that up in the
second mile. The first 2 miles we did really well keeping pace. Elizabeth and I
just talked, got to know each other and talked about running and racing. She wanted
to speed up and I kept telling her we needed to slow down, it made me laugh.
At mile 3 we actually split from the half
marathoners and went on our way, it was weird that it was so early in the race
because I really wasn’t ready to process the fact that I was running a full
marathon. I remember being surprised at how many people actually took the
marathon turn versus the half because usually the half marathoners are the
bigger crowd. The third mile was a little faster than I had wanted but not by
much. The fourth mile was back on track.
Usually about mile 4 is where I start settling in
and by the time mile 5 hit I was feeling pretty good. About this time the 5
hour pace group came upon us and stuck with us for a bit. I knew several people
that were in the 5 hour group so I said hi to them and chatted for a bit. Lisa
was in the group as well as Lucy, she’s the one who actually told me about this
race about a year ago and she’s the reason I signed up. There were also some
people from where I live in that group that I had met the night before. I didn’t
really want to join the pace group because I had looked at their pacing chart
the night before and I really didn’t like the way they had it paced out, they
had planned to have a really fast mile and then a really slow mile and back and
forth like that for the whole marathon, that makes me tired just thinking about
it! I work hard for consistency and didn’t really want to mess with what I had
been working on. But when the group came to us I knew mentally that was going
to mess with me. I wanted to keep them in my sight but not actually join them
and I most certainly preferred to stay in front of them if I could help it.
Elizabeth and I wound up playing leap frog with that group for pretty much the
entire race. In some ways it was good because it kept me on track and kept me
motivated but in other ways I think it wore me out more than I expected early
on.
About mile 5.5 I saw my mom and Rachel and Rachel ran
a couple of tenths with me asking how the course was and how I was feeling. So far
the course had been pretty flat and through some older neighborhoods, little
did I know I was in for a treat over the next 9 miles! I said bye to her and
she told me she would see me at mile 15. And then, the course got crazy on us!
The course was advertised as a “flat and fast
course” so obviously that’s what I expected. Lucy, who had run this race last
year said it was pretty flat but apparently they changed the course this year
and let me tell you it was not flat at all! From about mile 5 until mile 14
there were hills, lots of hill! It was a constant up and down, up and down
along the major roads. I know that this is exactly where I ruined myself for
that sub-5 hours. Hills don’t bother me and I’m actually a pretty decent hill
runner but the part that got me was not knowing just how many hills there were.
Every hill I would think, “this has got to be the last one” and so I would
speed up just to get over it and then there would be another one, and I’d say
the same thing, “this has got to be the last one” and speed up some more. If
you look at my pace from miles 5-11 you will see I did indeed speed up quite a
bit through here. Had I known the hills wouldn’t stop until mile 13.5 I
probably would have slowed down just a bit. But it is what it is. Despite the hills
these miles actually really flew by. I remember with each mile the beeped
Elizabeth and I would be say, “seriously, we are already at mile 7!” “Are we
really already at mile 8?” “How did we get to mile 10 already??” It was crazy
how fast it flew by!
At mile 8 I took half a vanilla GU and then at
mile 11 I took a few sips of Gatorade. At mile 12 I was really starting to feel
the hills so I took the rest of the GU packet that I had. By the time we hit
the half way point we were climbing another hill to go over a bridge, at mile
11 I had mentioned to Elizabeth that my right IT band was starting to hurt and
I just really felt defeated at yet another hill by the time I got half way. I
didn’t want to but I had to talk a small walk break. I took about 30 seconds
and let Elizabeth go on and I gave myself a mental pep talk. Thankfully that
was the last hill and I knew I would see mom and Rachel at mile 15 so I told
myself to get over myself and get moving. One thing Rachel and I always do on
our runs is sing Bon Jovi’s Half Way There song any time we reach the half way
point in our runs so I sang my song and picked it back up again. On the other side of the bridge there was a
race volunteer with his car parked keeping traffic from coming through and he
had a radio sitting on the hood of his car blaring songs and he was dancing.
This guy was exactly what I needed at this point and it made me smile as he
cheered me on and kept dancing.
Finally by the time I reached mile 14 I had calmed
myself back down and refocused myself and I was feeling good again. We were
running through neighborhoods now and we were off the hilly roads and I knew we
were headed to the out and back portion of the race that was along a paved
pathway. One of my main goals in this race was to run a solid race from miles
14-20, this was where I really struggled at the Dallas marathon and I knew I could
do better on this portion. This is one of the reasons why I am so proud of this
race; if you look at my splits throughout those 6 miles those are some of my
best miles of the day. I was running alone now because Elizabeth had gone on at
mile 13 and while I really did enjoy her company I am a solo runner so I think
this time was good for me to allow myself to be in my mind and let myself be
quite. I needed that at this portion of the race for sure.
I got to mile 15 and didn’t see my mom and sister
anywhere, I was getting a little upset over this because I had really been
looking forward to seeing them, mentally I needed to see them! I also thought Rachel
was going to run a little bit with me on this portion. I was a bit nervous
about the out and back portion because sometimes those can get monotonous. But
I have always said I find it very motivating to see all the fast runners come
by me on their way back so I was in some ways looking forward to this. Finally
about mile 15.5 I finally saw them at a water stop and I was relieved to see
them there. I didn’t think it would matter so much to me to have them out on
the course but it really did and I am so incredibly thankful that they would
come out there and cheer me on. I thought Rachel was going to jump on the trail
but she didn’t and I was kind of disappointed but I know the trail was kind of
narrow so she didn’t want to take up space that runners could be on.
At this point I was in front of the 5 hour pace
group, which had kind of broke up to only about 4 runners and I made up some
distance between us. As much as I was glad to be off the hills and as glad as I
was for change of scenery this wasn’t my favorite portion of the race.
Thankfully it flew by just about as quickly as the first several miles did. I
took another half of a GU packet about mile 17 and kept plugging along. I was
feeling really good through this portion but my Garmin would beep every now and
then that my battery was low. I was hoping it would hang on!!
I reached the turnaround point at mile 19.5 and
then made my way back out. At this point I thought I had a pretty sizeable lead
on the 5 hour pacers but when I turned around I saw they were only about a
quarter mile behind me, which is still good but I thought I had a lot more than
that made up. My goal was to keep running until mile 22 when I could see mom and
Rachel again, they would be at the spot where we entered the trail. I was
starting to get tired and noticed a bruise on the top of my left foot, it wasn’t
horrible, just a tad bothersome. I now had Elizabeth in my sights again and saw
that she was slowing down a bit. I finally reached her again about mile 21 and
we took a quick walk break. It actually hurt more to walk than to keep running
so we didn’t stop for too long. She said her shins were bothering her but
ultimately she felt ok. You can see mile 21 I slowed down a bit but then picked
it back up because I knew I could see mom and Rachel.
I got up to mile 22 and took the second half of my
second GU and grabbed a Gatorade, at this point I was taking water and Gatorade
from every other station roughly and drinking a few drinks, I didn’t want any
dehydration issues like on my last 22 mile training run. I told Rachel to run
with me some because I really needed to talk to her and have her encouragement
for a bit. Mentally I was hitting a wall but I knew I was so close to being
done. My mom actually captured an awesome picture of me right in front of the 5
hour pace group, I only wish I had finished like that!
I told Rachel how hard
the first part of the course was and how that really took a lot out of me. I
told her I was still holding a strong pace and still hopeful I could pull off a
sub-5. I also told her that I had found out from the pacer that at noon there
would be 3 people from Kansas City that had been at the Boston Marathon getting
to finish the race and receive their medals so they needed to be there to take
pictures just in case I wasn’t there. I saw the 5 hour pacer go ahead of me and
so I told Rachel she could go back to mom and I needed to keep up with them.
From mile 22-23 I hung on to that 5 hour pacer
like it was my lifeline. I was starting to tire out but needed that pull to get
me through. At mile 23 I just had to walk and she went on. I tried to keep her
in my sights but I just couldn’t. I started to feel really worn out and
defeated. I was so close by my average pace was slipping closer and closer to
being over the 5 hour time limit. I kept moving though. Then on another walk
break a second 5 hour pacer came up on me. What?! There were 2? I had no idea
so I hung onto her for a bit. She talked to me a lot and she was just awesome.
I could not have made it to mile 24 without her. She kept a steady pace and was
very friendly and encouraging but ultimately I had to walk and she went on.
Miles 24-26 were the roughest miles; at this point
I saw my sub-5 slip away and I just didn’t care. I was mad at myself that I
didn’t care more but I was just so tired from all those hills. I tried to run
as much as I could but I walked a lot from mile 25-26. There was one last water
stop through just past mile 25 and I walked through that. Then we made a right
turn to head through a school parking lot and across that to the finish line. I
could see the finish line and I really wanted to run the rest of the way but my
body just wouldn’t let me. Right about the time I hit the 26 mile marker my
Garmin said 5:02 and change and then I hear Lucy behind me telling me that she
better not catch me walking anymore. I was so glad she came up then because she
was just the push I needed to get me to the end. We chatted for a bit and then
I took off, I wanted to finish strong. Apparently that was the motivation she
needed too because we wound up racing it out to the finish line. It was fun and
I was glad for the motivation to push at the end. We got some great pictures
too!
Over all I was pleased with how well I ran this
race. Aside from the last 3 miles I ran a really strong marathon especially
given the unexpected hills on the course. I walked away disappointed at being
so close but over all very satisfied. The course was tough, and it took a lot
out of me.
My legs were very tired and sore that day and I actually remember
telling mom and Rachel that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to run a marathon again,
and that’s not like me at all. Obviously after a few days to let that digest I
feel totally differently, in fact my recovery time for this marathon was much
quicker than the last.
It feels good to walk away with an 11 minute PR and
knowing that I ran a solid race. It feels good to know that out of 26 miles
there are only 3 final miles that I really want to work on for the future, to
me that’s the confidence I need looking forward to the next one (and there will
be a next one!)
I’m not sure I would run this course again, it was
tough, but Garmin did a FANTASTIC job with the marathon. I mean they really did
a great job. The theme was awesome, the weather just absolutely perfect (although
I know they can’t control that, but the timing seems right) the course support,
the volunteers, water stops, all were amazing. The finish area was well done,
the course marked well, they even had elite runners, and hands down Garmin put
on a great race. I may not run the full again but I would definitely consider
running the half for sure. Overall this was a pretty perfect marathon experience
for me and it’s weird that it’s finally over.
It was an absolute pleasure to meet Elizabeth from Curly Pink Runner, she was just as sweet as could be and totally blew me out of the water with how well she did on her first marathon. I am so very glad we were able to run together for so much of it! You can read her recap here.
