The Freescale Austin Marathon and Me
I tell ya, with the various problems I've had, especially crashing at 18 miles on my 22 mile runs, I was a bit worried in the week coming up to the marathon. However, Friday evening I went to this site to read up on everything I needed to know about the race:
Freescale Austin Marathon
I had been reading the site for a while when I noticed a timer at the top right, counting down the seconds until the race. This wave of excitment went thru my entire body, only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to see the results of the months of grueling training. Only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to run my first marathon. I felt like a kid the day before Christmas, all the worry went right out the window.
Saturday was a long day, nothing seemed to hold my interest for long. I finally just hit the hay about 8 PM, planning on getting up at 4 to eat and get ready. It was a rough night, I didn't sleep good at all but finally the alarm was going off.
I got out of bed and checked the temperature. 27 degress, oh my God I'm gonna freeze my ass off. Oh well, what you gonna do. I made some coffee, had a breakfast bar and a banana and sat at the computer for a while. Around 5:30 I woke everyone up (my wife was driving me to the race) and we left about 6. It's not too far from my house to the race site but about 2 miles before the start, traffic was completely stopped. We sat in the line for about 30 minutes and finally got there 10 minutes before the start at 7. I jumped out of the car, ran to the start but no one was really lining up yet. I asked a lady who was walking by if they were starting on time and she said they had delayed till 7:30. Great, now I get to stand around freezing for 30 minutes. I was wearing a long sleeve shirt, a fleece pullover, shorts, sweats and my hat. My wife had loaned me an old set of ear muffs so that helped keep my ears warm but it was still freezing.
Finally, we start getting lined up. I was pretty far back, I never start at the front because I'm too slow. We couldn't really even hear the loudspeaker but eventually, I could see the line moving was up front. The movement finally gets to us but I decided to jump out of line for a last minute pee break. I was back pretty quick and crossed the start line about 8 minutes after the gun. For those of you who don't know, they give you an RFID chip you tie on your shoe and that records your actual start and finish times vs clock times. Starting to run after standing around is always nice, I always get an andreline rush but I just kept my pace slow and easy. We were running down a residential street and it was pretty packed, not that hard to run but impossible to pass. That was fine for me but some guys were jumping up on the sidewalk. There is this lady standing on the sidewalk yelling, "Ice, Ice, Ice." and pointing at the icy spot. Sure enough, here comes this knucklehead, totally ignores her and busts his ass big time. I didn't see if he got up or not, just kept running. I have to say something about the clothing during the first few miles. As folks started getting warmed up, they start stripping and most people just throw them on the side of the road. There was enough discarded clothing along the road way to start a second hand store. You had to see it to believe it. They have people that come along, pick it up and donate it to charity so nothing is really wasted but I was amazed at the sheer volume.
The first 5 miles or so were pretty uneventful. I felt pretty good even though my knee was talking to me a bit. I just kept plugging along. I would usually stop at the water stops and walk the short time it took to chug a drink, drinking mostly powerade but some water. There were a lot of spectators at certain spots so I kept looking for people I knew. I hadn't seen anyone so my focus had gone inside when I hear someone yelling. I looked up and it registers he is yelling, "Jim Edwards!!" It was a friend from work, Kenneth Mitchell. He is a big time runner (he wussed on this one) and has been a big suporter of mine so it was nice to see him out there. The course was mostly downhill so that was nice.
Miles 5 thru 10 were a little rough, my legs were bothering me a bit and I was letting my head play with me but I just kept going, keeping my pace easy and relatively slow. Right at about the 10 mile mark, once again my focus has gone inside and I hear someone yelling. There weren't as many spectators in this area so I look up and guess what, my wife, Janie, and my son, Jason (Bubba), are across the street yelling and cheering me on. I tell ya, seeing them was a real morale boost. My wife yells, "Where are your gloves?" Well, I had taken them off and stuck them in my wasteband so, thinking I wouldn't need them, I dropped them on the street and my son comes and picks them up. Big mistake. The temp hasn't gone up much but we have the wind at our backs. It might be 30 by now and when you hit an area where the wind gets you, it's freaking cold. More on that later. I ate 3 Clif Shot Bloks at around mile 10.
Miles 11 thru 15 went by pretty slow. Hitting mile 14 was a good milestone because I have been running 12 miles on Sundays so just tell myself that all we have left is a nice Sunday run. It was somewhere during this time when my left hand, the side the wind was blowing on I guess, starts getting really, really cold. The race packets had these cheap cotton gloves in them and a lot of people had dropped them but the pickings were getting slim. I finally found one, it was a bit damp but I didn't care. My left hand was so cold I couldn't even pick the thing up but I finally got it. I spent the next 10 miles switching it from hand to hand, warming one at a time.
Miles 16 thru 20 were pretty good actually. We started coming into downtown, my hood, and I started seeing familiar landscape. I also knew the end was in sight. I kicked up my pace a bit since it was mostly down hill and I was feeling good. I knew I probably should keep going slow but just decided to go for it. My hips and legs were hurting but I had lots of juice left. I would kick a couple of miles then walk a minute thru a water stop, then kick some more. It was working out pretty good for me and 16 thru 20 seemed to go by pretty quickly as we wound down thru UT. At mile 19 I passed a timer and it said, "3:30" That really encouraged me. I had wanted to do the marathon in 4 hours but realized early on that it was probably going to be closer to 5 hours. I really wanted to split the difference so when I saw I had an hour to make 7 miles, I was pretty jazzed.
20 - 26 were a bit rough. I was still running pretty good but walking more. Mile marker 21 took us around the capitol. There is a fountain on the south entrance and it had a lot of icicles haning on it so I guess the temp was still below freezing. Leaving the capitol grounds and heading down Congress is a pretty nice downhill run so I did that in good time. Just as we passed mile 22, Clif folks were handing out gel packets of this Mocha Mocha. I grabbed one because I was getting pretty spent and needed all the help I could get. I've never taken a gel before, they just flat don't appeal to me but with the end this close and me starting to lose the juice I needed some help. I held it till I saw a water stop, ripped it open and squeezed it in my mouth. Well, it was everything I expected, like taking a mouthful of mocha flavored Vaseline. I only took half and grabbed two cups of water to wash it down with. At 22 miles, the course headed west then doubled back. So, you can see the runners coming down the other side and there was nothing to prevent you from just crossing over (that I knew about anyway). It was sure tempting but as always, I just kept plugging on. The wind was in our faces. Luckily it wasn't very strong but it was still cold as hell. I had expected to shed some clothing along the way but was still wearing everything I had started with (except my gloves of course). However, my inner layer was soaked with sweat so that wind cut right thru. A lot of 22 - 24 was uphill so I ended up walking way more than I wanted to but when I ran, I was running strong with a good pace. I found a second discarded glove at about mile 23.5 and almost got run over when I bent down to pick it up. I would make myself run at least a mile before walking a short way. We finally get to the turnaround and 24 mile point. What I found at the turnaround was a chip mat, I guess to catch any cheaters who cut across. Let me tell ya, if you've never done a marathon, you have no idea how good it is to only have two miles to go. By this point, when I stop I'm having trouble breathing so have to stop and let my throat open up. Anyway, when I hit 24, I decided to kick it in and started running strong. I was tired, out of juice and my legs hurt like hell but two miles is like rolling over in bed. I ran a pretty good pace till about 25.2 miles or so when I had to stop and breathe again. I walked a ways till I saw a big crowd, no way was I going to walk past a crowd so took off.
Before I knew it, we were crossing the river bridge with only about a 1/4 mile to go. I hear someone coming up on my left and when I look over, it's a lady who looks to be older than me. Well, there simply ain't no way some old lady is going to beat me in the home stretch so I start kicking it up a bit. Guess what, so does she. Everytime I speed up, she matches me. We get about 3/4 of the way across the bridge and I learn a lesson in humility (not my first for sure) when I peter out and the old lady shows me her heels. I putter on for a while and enter the corral to the finish line. I decide to finish strong and kick it up a bit when there they are, Janie and Jason, screaming at the top of their lungs and cheering me on. I get a little choked up which affects my breathing but I'm still able to kick past one last person and cross the finish line with a chip time of 4:34:39.
I'm now a marathoner. I've done something a lot of people have done but a hell of a lot more never will. All the training paid off and while I certainly didn't break any records, I'm extremely pleased at my performance. I'm even more pleased that I stuck with it thru the whole training, not wimping out or getting lazy once. I'm pretty amazed I stayed healthy thru the whole thing as well. I gotta thank the most important person in my life, my wife Janie, for her support thru the whole thing. She not only rode along on my long runs but there were lots of evening when I'm sure she wanted to do something else but came home or went to the gym so I could run. She's not only the love of my life but my best friend, I'm a lucky man.
What's next? Well, there are two rather big deal 10ks in April, the Capitol 10k and the Governor's 10K. I plan on smoking those bad boys so need to start doing some speed work. I think I'm going to take a few days off though, my pegs need a little rest.
Freescale Austin Marathon
I had been reading the site for a while when I noticed a timer at the top right, counting down the seconds until the race. This wave of excitment went thru my entire body, only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to see the results of the months of grueling training. Only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to run my first marathon. I felt like a kid the day before Christmas, all the worry went right out the window.
Saturday was a long day, nothing seemed to hold my interest for long. I finally just hit the hay about 8 PM, planning on getting up at 4 to eat and get ready. It was a rough night, I didn't sleep good at all but finally the alarm was going off.
I got out of bed and checked the temperature. 27 degress, oh my God I'm gonna freeze my ass off. Oh well, what you gonna do. I made some coffee, had a breakfast bar and a banana and sat at the computer for a while. Around 5:30 I woke everyone up (my wife was driving me to the race) and we left about 6. It's not too far from my house to the race site but about 2 miles before the start, traffic was completely stopped. We sat in the line for about 30 minutes and finally got there 10 minutes before the start at 7. I jumped out of the car, ran to the start but no one was really lining up yet. I asked a lady who was walking by if they were starting on time and she said they had delayed till 7:30. Great, now I get to stand around freezing for 30 minutes. I was wearing a long sleeve shirt, a fleece pullover, shorts, sweats and my hat. My wife had loaned me an old set of ear muffs so that helped keep my ears warm but it was still freezing.
Finally, we start getting lined up. I was pretty far back, I never start at the front because I'm too slow. We couldn't really even hear the loudspeaker but eventually, I could see the line moving was up front. The movement finally gets to us but I decided to jump out of line for a last minute pee break. I was back pretty quick and crossed the start line about 8 minutes after the gun. For those of you who don't know, they give you an RFID chip you tie on your shoe and that records your actual start and finish times vs clock times. Starting to run after standing around is always nice, I always get an andreline rush but I just kept my pace slow and easy. We were running down a residential street and it was pretty packed, not that hard to run but impossible to pass. That was fine for me but some guys were jumping up on the sidewalk. There is this lady standing on the sidewalk yelling, "Ice, Ice, Ice." and pointing at the icy spot. Sure enough, here comes this knucklehead, totally ignores her and busts his ass big time. I didn't see if he got up or not, just kept running. I have to say something about the clothing during the first few miles. As folks started getting warmed up, they start stripping and most people just throw them on the side of the road. There was enough discarded clothing along the road way to start a second hand store. You had to see it to believe it. They have people that come along, pick it up and donate it to charity so nothing is really wasted but I was amazed at the sheer volume.
The first 5 miles or so were pretty uneventful. I felt pretty good even though my knee was talking to me a bit. I just kept plugging along. I would usually stop at the water stops and walk the short time it took to chug a drink, drinking mostly powerade but some water. There were a lot of spectators at certain spots so I kept looking for people I knew. I hadn't seen anyone so my focus had gone inside when I hear someone yelling. I looked up and it registers he is yelling, "Jim Edwards!!" It was a friend from work, Kenneth Mitchell. He is a big time runner (he wussed on this one) and has been a big suporter of mine so it was nice to see him out there. The course was mostly downhill so that was nice.
Miles 5 thru 10 were a little rough, my legs were bothering me a bit and I was letting my head play with me but I just kept going, keeping my pace easy and relatively slow. Right at about the 10 mile mark, once again my focus has gone inside and I hear someone yelling. There weren't as many spectators in this area so I look up and guess what, my wife, Janie, and my son, Jason (Bubba), are across the street yelling and cheering me on. I tell ya, seeing them was a real morale boost. My wife yells, "Where are your gloves?" Well, I had taken them off and stuck them in my wasteband so, thinking I wouldn't need them, I dropped them on the street and my son comes and picks them up. Big mistake. The temp hasn't gone up much but we have the wind at our backs. It might be 30 by now and when you hit an area where the wind gets you, it's freaking cold. More on that later. I ate 3 Clif Shot Bloks at around mile 10.
Miles 11 thru 15 went by pretty slow. Hitting mile 14 was a good milestone because I have been running 12 miles on Sundays so just tell myself that all we have left is a nice Sunday run. It was somewhere during this time when my left hand, the side the wind was blowing on I guess, starts getting really, really cold. The race packets had these cheap cotton gloves in them and a lot of people had dropped them but the pickings were getting slim. I finally found one, it was a bit damp but I didn't care. My left hand was so cold I couldn't even pick the thing up but I finally got it. I spent the next 10 miles switching it from hand to hand, warming one at a time.
Miles 16 thru 20 were pretty good actually. We started coming into downtown, my hood, and I started seeing familiar landscape. I also knew the end was in sight. I kicked up my pace a bit since it was mostly down hill and I was feeling good. I knew I probably should keep going slow but just decided to go for it. My hips and legs were hurting but I had lots of juice left. I would kick a couple of miles then walk a minute thru a water stop, then kick some more. It was working out pretty good for me and 16 thru 20 seemed to go by pretty quickly as we wound down thru UT. At mile 19 I passed a timer and it said, "3:30" That really encouraged me. I had wanted to do the marathon in 4 hours but realized early on that it was probably going to be closer to 5 hours. I really wanted to split the difference so when I saw I had an hour to make 7 miles, I was pretty jazzed.
20 - 26 were a bit rough. I was still running pretty good but walking more. Mile marker 21 took us around the capitol. There is a fountain on the south entrance and it had a lot of icicles haning on it so I guess the temp was still below freezing. Leaving the capitol grounds and heading down Congress is a pretty nice downhill run so I did that in good time. Just as we passed mile 22, Clif folks were handing out gel packets of this Mocha Mocha. I grabbed one because I was getting pretty spent and needed all the help I could get. I've never taken a gel before, they just flat don't appeal to me but with the end this close and me starting to lose the juice I needed some help. I held it till I saw a water stop, ripped it open and squeezed it in my mouth. Well, it was everything I expected, like taking a mouthful of mocha flavored Vaseline. I only took half and grabbed two cups of water to wash it down with. At 22 miles, the course headed west then doubled back. So, you can see the runners coming down the other side and there was nothing to prevent you from just crossing over (that I knew about anyway). It was sure tempting but as always, I just kept plugging on. The wind was in our faces. Luckily it wasn't very strong but it was still cold as hell. I had expected to shed some clothing along the way but was still wearing everything I had started with (except my gloves of course). However, my inner layer was soaked with sweat so that wind cut right thru. A lot of 22 - 24 was uphill so I ended up walking way more than I wanted to but when I ran, I was running strong with a good pace. I found a second discarded glove at about mile 23.5 and almost got run over when I bent down to pick it up. I would make myself run at least a mile before walking a short way. We finally get to the turnaround and 24 mile point. What I found at the turnaround was a chip mat, I guess to catch any cheaters who cut across. Let me tell ya, if you've never done a marathon, you have no idea how good it is to only have two miles to go. By this point, when I stop I'm having trouble breathing so have to stop and let my throat open up. Anyway, when I hit 24, I decided to kick it in and started running strong. I was tired, out of juice and my legs hurt like hell but two miles is like rolling over in bed. I ran a pretty good pace till about 25.2 miles or so when I had to stop and breathe again. I walked a ways till I saw a big crowd, no way was I going to walk past a crowd so took off.
Before I knew it, we were crossing the river bridge with only about a 1/4 mile to go. I hear someone coming up on my left and when I look over, it's a lady who looks to be older than me. Well, there simply ain't no way some old lady is going to beat me in the home stretch so I start kicking it up a bit. Guess what, so does she. Everytime I speed up, she matches me. We get about 3/4 of the way across the bridge and I learn a lesson in humility (not my first for sure) when I peter out and the old lady shows me her heels. I putter on for a while and enter the corral to the finish line. I decide to finish strong and kick it up a bit when there they are, Janie and Jason, screaming at the top of their lungs and cheering me on. I get a little choked up which affects my breathing but I'm still able to kick past one last person and cross the finish line with a chip time of 4:34:39.
I'm now a marathoner. I've done something a lot of people have done but a hell of a lot more never will. All the training paid off and while I certainly didn't break any records, I'm extremely pleased at my performance. I'm even more pleased that I stuck with it thru the whole training, not wimping out or getting lazy once. I'm pretty amazed I stayed healthy thru the whole thing as well. I gotta thank the most important person in my life, my wife Janie, for her support thru the whole thing. She not only rode along on my long runs but there were lots of evening when I'm sure she wanted to do something else but came home or went to the gym so I could run. She's not only the love of my life but my best friend, I'm a lucky man.
What's next? Well, there are two rather big deal 10ks in April, the Capitol 10k and the Governor's 10K. I plan on smoking those bad boys so need to start doing some speed work. I think I'm going to take a few days off though, my pegs need a little rest.
posted by Big Ed at 6:43 PM
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