Yesterday I ran the Charleston Marathon, my very first marathon. I have been training for this race the last 4 months. I made the decision last summer to take my running to the next serisous level to see if I could do this.
And I did it.
What an amazing feeling.
Friday I took the day off of work to be stress free and take it easy. To be honest I'd been starting to get nervous all week.
I took my daughter to school, ran errands, picked up my race packet and then came home and cleaned. So I didn't do a whole lot of the relaxing I planned to do.
The race expo was very bare bones. It was basically race packet pick up and nothing else.
Some background to this race. It started 3 years ago as the Riverfront Race Festival. It was a half marathon, 10k and 5k. This was the very first 10k I ran. Then last year they added the marathon. So then they sort of changed it to the Charleston Marathon.
So it's taking some time to get sponsors and work out the kinks. And they have a lot of kinks. To be very honest I really wanted to do the Disney Marathon that was last weekend but it was so expensive, then the travel, so logistically this one is local and fit our budget and schedule. It wasn't bad overall, just was expecting a little more.
Saturday morning I woke up about 5:00 to eat and start getting ready. The race didn't start till 8:00 but I wanted to make sure I wasn't rushed. I ate a bagel and had to force it down. My stomach was not wanting food due to the nerves but I knew I needed to eat.
I showered and was dressed by 6:15. Had all my stuff ready to go so once my husband was ready we were out the door by 6:25, ahead of schedule. We were driving downtown Charleston to the race start on East Bay Street.
It was a cold morning. 30 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. We made it with time to spare so Ricky waited with my until it was time to line up. No corrals or anything, which was fine because while it was crowded, this wasn't a big huge event.
It was cold and my toes started to go numb. I hate that!!
Then before I knew it we were off! Ran down along the Battery (a tourist attraction - looks out onto the harbor). Then we ran up King Street (awesome resturants and shops). Then we were headed out of Charleston into North Charleston. Unfortunately it wasn't the prettiest course at this point but it was flat and sometimes it's hard to find all the nice places. Here in Charleston they're mixed in with some not so nice places. A side note: this is what amazes me when people say "Oh Charleston is so pretty." Parts of it are. There's a lot of parts that are not. I hate to talk bad about the area I live but all in all Charleston is not a pretty area. The areas that are nice you have to be able to afford to live there.
OK back to the race. Once we got up into the North Charleston/Park Circle area it started to get serious. The half marathoners broke off at mile 11. Oh how badly I wanted to go with them.
I was fine at that point but once we got out of downtown there was a serious and nasty headwind. The. Whole. Way. The. Whole. Race. And it was COLD.
You could see all the runners around just head's down and pushing forward.
I was doing very well, keeping my pace conservative. I had to resist going out fast and reminding myself I was not running the half, my time would come to go faster (it never came but that's ok).
Around mile 15-16 I started to get tired and I thought "not yet!! 10 more to go, just make it to 20." There were no spectators, not many runners around me so I was started to lose motivation.
Fortunately the pacer for the 4:30 came up behind me and I started running with them for a long time. She was awesome, I didn't catch her name, but she really helped pep me up. Running with a group again got my legs moving. Actually she said that we were 6 minutes ahead of schedule. I passed mile 20 with ease and felt great.
Around mile 20 we head into the Riverfront park area. So the wind picked back up because we were next to the water and no trees around. At that point I saw Ricky, my friend's Pam, Earl, Jill and Steven. And they had signs. Made me feel so good to see them!!
I was still feeling good at that point so I knew I could finish this race strong. 6 more miles? Piece of cake!! Ha! Actually I made it to 22.5 before I really started to feel it. I wouldn't even really call it hitting the wall, more like I was tired of fighting the wind.
The bad part of the last 5 miles is you go all the way down on this desolte road, it's an out and back so you see the runners that have already made the loop and you are very jealous of them. This road seemed to go on FOREVER!!!!! There was nothing pretty about this road and the wind just wipped right through there. I stopped many times to get gatorade and fuel but by this point my legs were just so tired. After I made the loop it was another 2.5 miles back to the finish and I was determined to make it.
I got a little bummed when the 4:30 pacer passed and took off. I could not catch her no matter how hard I tried. Damn wind!! I walked twice and then told myself to hurry up and get out of this wind. It was time to finish. I wouldn't make my 4:15 goal but at that point I didn't care.
Once I hit mile 24 I stopped and walked one last time and then ran till the finish. Still windy but when I saw 25 I picked up the pace some (or tried to). At 26 I saw the rest of my family gave them high fives and then took off to the finish line!
Chip time was 4:34:06! Avg pace 10:26.
However my Garmin time was 4:33:55 and I started it right as I crossed the start so I'm not sure what happened there.
My daughter and me above. She was so happy to see me and I her. My family said she was so good the entire time they waited.
I was so happy to be done! I got my marathon medal! I ran a marathon!!
In hindsight I would have loved to hit my goal time of 4:15 and I really think I was in good shape to do it but that headwind was a killer. Many runners on facebook commented how bad it was so I know I was not alone. I think there were only 3 areas of the course where I remember feeling relief when the wind wasn't blowing and that's when I was able to pick up my pace. But once it started blowing it took all my energy and effort to keep going. And like I said that last stretch of 5 miles it was really kicking everyone's butt. I could see it in their faces.
I felt really good and strong overall! I am so proud of myself for this accomplishment, I felt on top of the world when I finished. Many times over the last 4 months I wanted to quit just because of life. Work got stressful, husband, daughter, things to do. I really poured myself into this training but towards the end, I have to admit, I was getting burned out. I missed running for fun and am looking forward to not being tied into a training schedule.
I would love to run another but it's going to have to wait. I really want to have another baby so we are going to concentrate on that the next couple of months.
I am running another half marathon in 3 weeks. I haven't decided if this is going to be for a PR or for the sake of running. Depends on how I feel when I do my first post marathon run. For today I am resting. I can barely walk. I have sore muscles that didn't even know existed :)
I would have to say the half marathon is my favorite distance. But I will never say never to another marathon!
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