I'm like a broken record. I keep saying that my next race I'll train for real, seriously I will. I mean it this time. When I ran Harrisburg, I put six panic filled weeks of 40+miles in order to finish. I remember shuffling my lead bearing legs down the streets of Harrisburg for the last six miles and thinking about the lunacy of it all. Who doesn't take three to five months to train for these? This kid, that's who. I had good intentions for Pittsburgh. I was going to train all winter/spring and come out amazing. After fighting illness for two months, I just kept putting it off. Well, time catches up to you and it isn't forgiving.
Running without preparation is something a lot of us twenty-somethings do. We think, how hard can it be?!? The last time I didn't really train much and it didn't hurt THAT bad... I could tolerate it again. What we twenty-somethings fail to consider is all of the other variables that go into race day. For example: allergies, colds, hot days, etc. Last Thursday as I'm thinking of everything I need to pack for my race, I start to feel off. By Friday I have crazy sinus pressure, a little feverish, headache, and my allergies are going nuts. At this point I'm not going to forgo the race... heck no. I've already made a playlist, packed, and raised money for charity. Screw it. I'll just take it easy on the run. I've already made the excuse of not training. Everyone knows it. No one expects much out of me Sunday anyways. Let's just finish this.
Race Morning:
I wake up on my own after a restless night. It's 4:45am and my head is super uncomfortable but I won't take the Tylenol Sinus meds. Rule number one: Don't take anything weird on race day. I get dressed in my super orange Run to Stop MS outfit and carefully braid my hair. This is one ritual that brings focus to my race days. (Eating your hair with your gel packs isn't ideal and doesn't add to the nutritional value. It's just gross.) I'm as ready as I'm going to get. My fuelbelt and gear check bag were carefully packed the night before. Time to wake up Catie. This was easier than I had imagined. I wait the 15minutes it takes her to get ready and eat my morning breakfast of homemade rice krispie treats (Thanks Sally!). My favorite pre-race meal. Ohh.... and I have a few chugs of Pepsi while we wait for the city bus. Again, race ritual and before you go judging me... it works.
The lady at the hotel didn't give me the best directions after "this is where you find the bus". My sister,Catie, and I had no clue where we were supposed to get off or where to go after we exited the bus. Pittsburgh might as well be a foreign country. Fortunately for us, the bus was packed with racers. We play follow the leader down to race central. This is where things start to get a bit hairy. Due to the Boston event, security was really tight. You couldn't exit one area and regain entry. So, decide on your corral change before you get near the corral. They will not let you out. Gear check was also a hike away. That didn't bother me before the race. (After the race I did say " You've got to be kidding me." to one of the volunteers when she gave me directions to gear check. Sorry whoever you were.) Thirty minutes later I find the corral I've chosen. I was assigned "B" but due to my illness I decided to jump back to "C".
The website boasted that in celebration of Cinco de Mayo, we would be doing the Macarena before race start. Mr. DJ started the music before I even made it to my corral... and no one was responding to it. Huge disappointment. I was ready to relive my middle school days for three short minutes. I pictured ending the Macarena and starting my dance party playlist and getting into it before the gun went off... I guess this was the universe's way of telling me that the dance party marathon was not meant to be.
I found the 4:00 pace group in the back of the corral. So I parked myself next to the two gentlemen holding the signs. One had his name listed as "Kal-el". I looked him up and down and thought...no, this guy is not a superman. I asked him if that was his real name or if he just loved Superman. We all know the answer to that one. Big kid. After the lady crooned the national anthem (as slow as she could) and a moment of silence the race begun. My corral shifted forward and nine minutes after race start, I was able to jog along. I knew that 4:00 is around a 9:10ish pace so I kept trying to tell myself to reel it in. Keep it light. Next thing I knew we've made it one block and I've already lost the pace group. Crap. I feel slow and easy so I keep on, keeping on. My play list for the first few miles was pretty awesome. I was smiling and lip singing along over the first of many bridges and just excited. It felt like the city of Pittsburgh had wandered outside to say hello at 7am. That's one thing I like about these big races. You may have to try not to step on fellow runners for the first few miles, but the excitement from the crowd is contagious. You can't help but let it infect you. This is my real race fuel. You smile, I smile. You roar and I roar right back. All of this adds up to "let's do this". Heck, enough people and I feel like I could win this thing.
At the 10k mark I hit my first check in. 54:29, 8:47 pace. I'm a big fan of accountability. When I know people are watching, I can't let them down. My family, my friends, my roommates, random people who stalk me... all of this makes me want to give 'em something to look forward to. My roommates were near the University waiting for me around the 20k mark. I gave them a general time and knew I had to hit it... what I didn't take into consideration was that I ran faster than expected. I hit the half way point almost seven minutes faster than I told them. They could have been riding the elevator down when I blew past. Thank goodness for Starbucks down the street. They were already outside.
The dance party play list had been serving me well. By the half mark I was at 1:53:36, 8:40 pace and still feeling pretty awesome. The sun still wasn't beating me down and Pittsburgh does an excellent job providing fluid stations. Heck, even locals set up "mom and pops water stops". I wasn't that desperate but I appreciated the gesture.(Not a "drink the koolaid" type). I cheese for the camera as I run past my roommates and continue on course. Less than a mile later, the storm starts brewing.
I put a lot of stock in the power of the mind and music. Any activity that sucks (cleaning the bathroom, homework, etc) has always been improved by a great playlist. When I ran the Harrisburg Marathon, I credited Christina Aguilera's Fighter with getting me through six miles of that race. I don't think I could have climbed those hills without her. Unfortunately for Pittsburgh, my iPod died before mile 14. I look back and I'm not sure what happened. It plugged up just fine after the race and synced. It even said it was at full power. I think the running gods were testing me. They wanted to know if I had the meddle to medal. I had a second where I thought about chucking the stupid nano on the ground and leaving it but I didn't want to pay for a new one. Smart move.
Adam Goucher was quoted as having said "So many people, when they get out the door and they’re running, it’s when they do their best thinking, and it clears their mind of the stress and they just feel so much better." Adam and I apparently have a different style of running. When I run it's more primal. My brain shuts down and all higher functions go on hiatus. I can't tell you what happened between mile 14 and 19 but I remember the moment a really hot relay dude ran by at mile 19. (I can only comment on the back side, I never did catch a glimpse of the front and I'm still disappointed.) This guy had it going on. Great hair, really really great everything else, perfect proportions, tan... ohh and he wasn't slow (It's why I never saw the front. Sad sigh.) Dude had it going on. These primitive thoughts got me to mile 20.
At the check-in at mile 20 I was still steadily hopping along. 2:55:05, 8:46 pace. 10k to go. No problem. Except I feel like I'm running on something sticky. My first thought was "how much Gatorade did people spill?!?" That's what happens when higher brain function shuts off. Stupid conclusions. What I didn't consider was that I had a blister that had burst. Super gross.
I used to love downhills. Then I met mile 23. Normally the thought of "just a 5k" would be elating. Not this time. Nothing hurt worse than the downhill pounding my poor feet took. I felt every step reverberating up my legs after each stinging footfall. That was one nasty mile; enough to hurt me, not enough to break me. Steady she goes.
At mile 24 things had leveled out but a more serious problem developed. Now for those of you married to doctors... maybe you shouldn't mention this but I started having pains in my chest area, left cavity. I had felt this pain before so I was pretty sure it was my lung and not my heart... I had been having a bit of chest tightness due to the illness so this development didn't surprise me. Scared the crap out of me... but I figured what the hell, there are so many medic check points the last two miles, I should be fine. I didn't realize that a 23year old guy had already died on the course a mile from the finish right outside a medic station. Thinking back on it, I'd like to say that I'd have slowed down, walked, maybe gotten check out before continuing... but I know I wouldn't. Even without my higher brain function being shut down, nothing meant more than finishing. Knowing that I was going to break 3:50 if I kept going... I would have kept going. Pain is temporary, pride is forever. Official finishing time: 3:49:37, 8:46 avg. When I finished, they draped the largest, heaviest medal around my neck. I thought I was going to choke from it. I wore it with pride back to the car.
One day I'll train for real and lay it all out. I'll do more than one 16 miler and call it good. If I do, beware. This girl is on fire.
