Behind a Rock and 26.2 miles

At the beginning of 2010 I had no ambitions on running a marathon. June rolls around and I guess my wife had heard enough complaining from me in regards to how stressed out I was all the time. She knows if I’m working out regularly my stress tends to vanish so she signed me up with a program at Luke’s Locker in Allen called Allen Fit. She had trained with Luke’s in Houston several years ago and stated she loved their programs. I had even went on quite a few runs with them back in my triathlon training days. Heck, why not, I could do the half or the full. Deep down I knew I was going to do the full so the full is the group I stood proudly with on that early Saturday morning in June.

The first 3 to 4 runs I did with the group were horrible. They were pace runs of about 3-4 miles. Basically they were trying determine our correct pace group for the rest of our training. In hindsight it was kind of a blessing that they did not go well. I was placed in the Yellow group. The Yellow group would end up with an average pace for most long runs anywhere between 9:30-10:30 min/mi. Not really where I wanted to be but definitely where i needed to be.

Training with a group was good for me. For roughly 22 Saturday mornings we met at 5:45 to go on runs ranging from anywhere between 6-22 miles. Some runs I felt great and some not so great. As my preparation became more finely tuned so did my runs. At about the half way point in our training we had a race , the Tour de Fleurs, in very warm conditions. I had a horrible race and I learned in this race that when you start running distance pace is the key. I went out too fast because i felt good. If that race would have been 8 miles I would have done great however the last 4.4 killed me. Unfortunately, I did not learn my lesson for the marathon.

For the rest of the training, I held back the urge to take off, and by the time the marathon rolled around I felt great. I could control my pace with the group and if I got to 22 miles in the race and felt good I could take off from there. Well, great plans can always be foiled some how. The Dallas White Rock Marathon was held on Dec 5th 2010 under perfect conditions for me. Clear skies and fairly cold at the start but warming up by the hour.

Judy and I had parking issues and did not get to the race until about 7:35 for an 8:00 start. I was not able to find my Luke’s pace group. However, I did find a few in a pace group faster than mine so I decided to start with them. Well, most would say a big mistake. Not me, I actually knew that they would leave me so I was just going to try to focus on a 10:00-10:30 min/mi pace. You know this is hard to do when you are all by yourself and your Garmin is old and is showing my pace all over the place. At both the 6 mi and 12 mi markers I felt good. No issues. Somewhere between 12-15, I started to develop a little pain in the ball of my right foot. Pain I had not experienced in any of my training. I had to push through, and at mile 18 I still felt good, but my foot was starting to bother me. If I walked through a water stop it would throb, but the minute I ran again it would go away. So run I did, miles 19-22 were a blur. It started getting a little hilly and my legs just did not have it this day. I got through the hills but that was it. My body kept telling me to walk and this is what I did. I know, as all marathoners do, once you start walking that far in, you are cooked. Well, I was.

In hindsight, I’d say I’d do a lot of things differently but you know what, my goal was to finish, and that is just what I did. I’m proud of my accomplishment and that is all that matters. Marathons are not easy just ask Pheidippides. Then again he ran and fought in a war prior to his fatal last run. I guess I was just hoping that he could have started at a town much closer to Athens.

Where do I go next? I’m not exactly sure. I hope to keep running maybe some half-marathons. I really feel that distance is more suited to me. If another full is in the cards I will play that hand when dealt. For now another goal, accomplished!