Earlier this year my wife declared that she might want to try a marathon in 2014. Having already done a marathon in the past, and having not really enjoyed the experience, I was hesitant, but decided to sign up, with her, for the Twin Cities Marathon.
My previous marathon experience was miserable. I hated the training, I had to suffer through an injury, and by the time race day came I just didn't care anymore, and I didn't want to even be there. So needless to say my end result was less than desired, with a total time on course of 5 hours 20 minutes.
This year though was a complete dichotomy of my previous experience. I found a great 3-day-per-week training program that helped keep me injury free throughout the season. It also helped keep me from becoming sick of running, and losing my passion for it. It also probably helped that my wife was also doing the training program, and our long runs usually involved us going to a large park together to run. In addition to remaining injury free, I actually still enjoyed my long training runs, all the way to the day of the race, which was a huge bonus.
Therefore, when I hit the start line this year I was feeling great. I decided to chase the 4:30 pacer, ignore my watch, and run to 'feel' as opposed to technology. I ended up keeping the pacer in sight all the way until mile 17, and for many miles I was the one being chased with the pacer a good quarter of a mile behind me. I worried a bit that I was going too fast, but since I was still over a 10 minute mile I don't think it affected me that much. My body was telling me that I was doing OK.
I started to get a bit of a headache around mile 10, and even though it was annoying I don't think it played a large part in my race. My biggest issue was around my right calf muscle. During the previous week I had been feeling some twinges in my left calf, so I spent a lot of time working on loosening up that muscle. However, in my foolishness, I ignored my right calf. That was my downfall as I started experiencing more twinges (this time on the right side) around mile 17-18, and then full on cramps around 20. I tried to work them out, but they just kept getting worse, and from mile 22-26, I was forced to walk almost exclusively. Any type of a running pace started the process of completely seizing up my right calf.
I was able to muster a weird run with my right ankle locked in a 90 degree position for the last quarter mile or so, to cross the finish line, but apart from that it was a much slower day than I expected. My final time was 5:13, which was a full 7 minutes faster than my previous effort, but it did exceed my desired goal by 13 minutes.
Despite this fact, I have to say that I felt really good about today. Sometimes things like cramps happen, and there's not much you can do about them. By the time I had to completely walk at mile 22, I decided that I was going to enjoy a lovely day of walking down Summit Ave., enjoying all the festivities and people cheering for us racers. Even though I had to accept that sub-5 hours was out of my grasp, I still found the mental wherewithal to enjoy what I could do.
Additionally, I was VERY pleased in my race up to that point. I was feeling incredibly comfortable for the first 20 miles, and my time for those 20 was the fastest time I had ever put up. So, I was incredibly satisfied with my performance on that section. If the cramping wouldn't have happened, I probably could have pulled off a 4:40-4:45 time, and shattered my old PR. Although that didn't happen I have no regrets or ill thoughts of today.
Based on today, I see no reason why I won't run more marathons in the future. It's obvious that I can do them, and perform the way I want. This experience at the Twin Cities Marathon showed me how cool and fun marathons CAN be, and helped erase the horrible taste of my previous marathon from my mind. I felt at peace with the run today, with the crowds, the course and everything about the experience, and that's probably the best "runner's high" I could ask for.
