I'm a Marathoner - Race Report

Friday Ronnie was able to get off work early and was home before I got the kids. So I walked up to the school to pick them up and we walked home. Bonus miles for them. We got in the car and headed to Nashville. First stop was the expo, then to the hotel. The a/c-heat did not work right in our room and with the smallest of adjustments the room temp changed drastically. We went to Blackstone for dinner, it was really hard for me to resist one of their beers but I managed by thinking back to Tom King. Dawn and her kids got to Nashville right after we finished eating. We meet them back at the hotel and tried to get everyone settled down and to bed at a decent time. I woke up at 3:00am and could not get back to sleep. At 5:30 we got everyone up and dressed. Tracy called to tell me they were stuck in traffic and didn’t know if they were going to make it. I told her I was waiting on them!!! Ronnie and I walked to the start and Dawn drove the kids to the finish then had to rush to get them to their start. They made it!!! The kids raced in age groups and Dalton’s group went before the littler kids.

His group took off then the K-2 kids lined up. At the start some of the kids took off running, it was a race after all. So Bryce took off with them. Dawn walked with Laine and Casey. And tried to keep Bryce in sight. Dalton caught Bryce at the finish line and they all got metals!!!

In the meantime, Ronnie went ahead to his corral and started the race. I waited for the others. Tracy, Gary and Lana finally made it. We dropped our stuff off at gear check, peed behind a bush, and headed for the start line. We had already missed our corral so we just jumped in with whatever one was about to take off. The race started for us. Everything was going good, we had a good pace going and I felt great. We spotted Ronnie at about 5 miles, I think. That is when we lost Tracy too. Lana and I kept running. At mile 8 I was starting to hurt, I was chafed between my legs. We got some water at a water stop and went through a spray. It burned my legs. At about mile 10 we finally saw a medical tent and grabbed some Vaseline. That made all the difference. I was doing much better. A few miles later there were people handing out Vaseline on sticks and I got more (I grabbed a stick from every person offering them from that point on). At mile 15 I started falling back and Lana kept going. I had her in sight for a long time and almost caught her at the next water station. After that I lost her completely. I saw Gary sometime after that and we ran together for a few minutes. Rae and Brent were at about mile 21 and that gave me another push to keep going. Thanks guys for hanging around to cheer us on and great job on your run!!! Right after that I passed runners that were ahead of me and I was looking for Lana. I didn’t see her so knew that she couldn’t be that far ahead so I pushed on. Just passed the mile 24 maker I saw Leslie and begged her “Make me run”. She jumped in next to me and literally pushed me to mile 25. Then she headed back to find Tracy and push her along. Dawn and the kids were at the turn to the finish line. They yelled “Hey, mama”. I waved and headed in. Not far from the finish I saw Kim (who finished her first half) cheering for me and I kicked it in. I ran as fast as I could and crossed the finish line with a time of 4:25:05.
I wound my way through the finishers area collected my medal, got water and a blanket, had the timing chip removed and picture taken that I am SURE will be GREAT! Then I got a banana, muffin and an orange. Finally I got my sandals which are so much cooler then last years. I spotted Lana and Briar. Briar missed the kid’s race but ran the last mile with Lana, he didn’t get his metal!!! As I left the finishers area I saw Dawn and the kids. We got in line and got the kids some food and me a much needed beer! I got my stuff from gear check and came back to the hill were we were sitting and Laurie and her kids found us. Turns out it was a great place to sit because we found everyone. We all finished and are all MARATONERS now.
I am glad I did it but I am disappointed with my performance. I did not struggle with my runs while training like I did race day. Where was that race day adrenaline??
Well on to the next event. I have GJCC Tri coming up in a month and don’t even have a training plan yet.