( Jump to mile: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 26.2 )

Amazingly enough, I got a good night’s sleep Saturday night. I was in bed by ten, and asleep by half past. The alarm goes off at five, and I swing into action. Not quite fast enough, unfortunately. Even though I have everything laid out, by the time that I’m showered, clean shaven, dressed, and ready to go its already six o’ clock. I’m wearing my Sauconys, new marathon socks, Nike running shorts, and the light RunTex 30K shirt that I earned in Buda. Oh - and a trash bag. I’ve taken five Advils. I’ve petted the dog. I’m ready to go.

Alright, so we’re fifteen minutes behind schedule - that’s not a big deal. As we back out of the driveway, I realize that I forgot my wedding band. Can’t have that! So add a few more minutes to pull back in, jump out of the car, pick it up, et cetera. Stephanie is driving me up to the start, so we head up I-35 and take 183 North. Exit MoPac, planning to go North and U-Turn. Whoops! There’s a huge line of traffic awaiting us, and we’re already committed to MoPac. We head South, take the first exit, and weave through the neighborhood until we come out at 360. Then across and park in the Gateway shopping center.

I’m glad for the trash bag now, even if the holes have “expanded” somewhat since I was sitting on it. The wind would be pretty biting, otherwise. We walk fairly quickly over to Bahama Breeze - which is further away than I would have thought. There are other people heading that way, so I’m not as concerned as I should have been. Once we get there, I hear the announcer saying that there’s ten minutes left before the start. Whoops! Angela starts singing the national anthem and, even though the mic amplifies a barking dog nearby, she did a beautiful job.

I ask a race official what to do with the drop bag, and he points me towards some white tents. I see the SockMonkeys as I pass, but don’t want to take too much time to say hello. Wait in line a minute, then hand my bag over - turns out that I did the right thing in writing my bib number on the sides, and they toss it onto the pile behind them. Now, of course, I really need to pee. Five minutes to go. I look at the porta-potties and the line is ten deep. Yeah, right. Its into the trees for me - and more than a few others.

Having relieved myself of some tension, if not all, I realize that I haven’t stretched yet. Eep! Five minutes to go. I do some stretches, mainly concentrating on the right ITB, but can’t do anyhere near the 20 minutes that I did before our 21 miler. The group starts to move towards the road, and I run to catch up. They’re all here, and relieved that I made it (as I was). We try to move back towards the 4:30 pace group, but get stopped at about 3:45 and decide wait for them to come to us. Tanya joins us now - I wasn’t the last one after all! More stretching, groin, calves and quads, and then “We’re off!” Well, the leaders are off. Its a minute before the crowd moves significantly, and another one before the 4:00 pacers meet us, at which point we can’t hold it any more and jump into the fray.

And now we’re really off! I shed my trash bag and, clutching it in one hand, let the crowd carry me towards the pads. First at a walk, then a trot, then we’re actually running (12:00 pace or so) when we hit the gate. Arms (and trash bag) up high for the cameras, big smiles, we’re feeling good. Of course, there are no trash cans along the route, so I get to hold onto the bag for a while longer. I see Stephanie briefly on the right, waving, and then we’re away from the crowd.

The following mile times are from my Forerunner’s autolap feature. They were a little off near the end, but not significantly so, probably because of the extra distance that I did back and forth, side to side (it had me running 26.4 miles total during the race). I took two and a half minutes away from the last one (which measured as .4 miles rather than .2) and added it to mile 20, which I think is where most of the error slipped in (by comparing its times to the official splits). I also shaved 1:30 from mile 25 and added it to mile 24 - they weren’t that far off, but because it was offset by about .2 at this point, it caught two miles worth of rest and stretching in one mile, and none in the next. This may or may not be accurate, but it gives a pretty fair idea of what was going on. The distance on the watch was actually within twenty seconds at mile 17, so it must have been thrown off at some point between there and mile 23.5 anyway. The total remains the same. Ah, well. No technology is perfect.

Mile 1 - 11:05
There are porta-potties about halfway along the first mile, and they already have lines. There are also people darting in and out of the bushes. Already, my planning - poor as it was - is proving better than some people’s. My left shoelace comes untied a little later so I move over to the sidewalk to tie it and drop my bag on the ground to do so, leaving it there when I leave. Acceleration back up to speed is easy, but moving through the masses back to my group is not. Still, I manage it just before the first water stop. My plan is to get PowerAde at every stop, and walk the full minute. I accomplish the first part but not the second as we’re off and running about thirty seconds later. I’m not losing my group this early!

Mile 2 - 10:32
This is pretty cool. The first mile went by so fast, and now we’ve crossed over MoPac and are heading East. The sun is starting to come up, so I’m squinting a little, but its not too bad. The pace is good, and I feel strong. The next water stop comes up right around Burnet road, and I stop to do more stretching on a friendly street-sign. I’m not going to talk about every waterstop from here on out, since I always walked and always got PowerAde instead of water. Since I’m on the subject though, some volunteers were great at filling the cups about 2/3 full, others would hand you a cup with less than an inch of fluid in it. In those cases, I just got extras and dumped them into the cup until I had a full one. Slightly annoying, but not that big a deal.

Mile 3 - 11:27
Now we’re running through an industrial park which lasts until mile four or so. Things are going fairly well, but my knee is starting to twinge, just a little. I decide that a little caution here will serve me better than sticking to my group, and pull off to stretch. Things are a little better afterwards, but its still not as good as it was when I started. Putting it out of my mind, I try to catch up with the pack.

Mile 4 - 10:12
By now, I’m realizing that I have to pee again. I try to ignore it, but some things won’t be ignored. There are some porta-potties, but the lines are ten people deep again. Screw it. Veering off to the left, I find a gap between two small office buildings and let go. Ah, public urination: this is probably the one situation when its not just accepted, its almost expected. Now I run back into the field, feeling much better, and again increase my speed up to high nines to try to make up some of the lost time. I keep getting more twinges from my knee, and they’re getting painful.

Mile 5 - 13:41
Even with the regular stretching, my knee is starting to hurt. This is double-plus ungood. I start to wonder if that cortisone shot did anything at all, and feel myself tensing up. Luckily I notice it, and force myself to just relax which, to my amazement, works. The knee is still getting sore though. Stopped for some more stretching, but that didn’t seem to make much of a difference.

At one point, we’re doing a tight turn to the left and I’m a bit annoyed because the bank is making it impossible for me to run on the road crown - there isn’t one. Running on the crown, or at least the flattest part of the road, is becoming increasingly important to my continued well-being at this point. That’s when I realize that we’re crossing under 183. We ran right past Gold’s Gym, along the frontage road for at least half a mile, and I hadn’t even noticed it. Wow. Talk about “highway hypnosis!”

Mile 6 - 12:09
At the end of this mile I’m expecting to meet my whole support staff for the first time. I stretched at the beginning, and halfway down I stopped for a minute or two and really worked my ITB. It seemed to work, and I was able to head down with a smile and even a bit of a spring in my step. Then I see them - on the left, directly in front of Einstien’s Bagels where they met for breakfast, holding a big “Stanford Support Staff” sign. Woop! I vector myself across traffic to meet them, and smile. It really adds a lot to see them out there.

First off, Stephanie says that she has some Gu for me. Has it really been six miles? The time really has been flying. I ask her for another four Advil as well. Marcus threatens to count them and limit me, I tell him that Dr. McCarty said that I could exceed the recommended dosage. I’m not sure she’d be happy with the amount that I planned to exceed it with during the race, but one day won’t kill me. I hope. While she’s getting them out, I stretch the ITB some more on a street sign, trying to act nonchalant about the whole thing. Taking the Gu and the pills, I’m glad that Stephanie thought to bring water for me to wash them both down. Then its a quick, “I love you,” to my wonderful wife, a wave to the team, and off to the races again.

I found out after the fact that I looked pretty bad at this point - like I was running injured (which I was). So much for fooling my loved ones. Still, it makes me glad that I made the effort - who knows what I would have looked like otherwise! My dad (again, I found this out later), turned to Marcus and said, “He’s going to stop if he gets hurt, right?” and got a quick lesson in Marathon Stupidity 101 - it would have taken a lot to stop me at this point.

Mile 7 - 10:16
I’m running better now. Whether its the Advil kicking in, the extra two minutes of stretching, or just the emotional boost from seeing everyone, things are certainly moving along well. I find myself running next to a guy in a matching 30K shirt, and start to chat with him. Turns out that his name is Craig, and he’s doing his first marathon after living on the course for a couple of years. He’s in the 10:20 group at AustinFit, so we’ve seen each other around the place. As we run down Great Northern, he tells me that we’re now on his local run - he’s a great person to chat to as we cruise South.

Along the way, we pass a scruffy looking couple sitting in their front yard. They’re drinking beer and smoking, yelling occasionally to the runners to give it up, to come over to the dark side. And end up looking like they did? Not likely.

Mile 8 - 11:21
We come up to the elementary school where his little boy (Clark) is in 1st grade. There’s a german shepherd dog sitting on the bleachers who really wants to be running with us. An enthusiastic band is playing as well, which is another great pick-me-up. Craig mentions that there were rumored to be many bands along the way, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Somewhere along the way we see two bagpipers, unfortunately within hearing distance of each other (unfortunately from my perspective - they were pretty cool to see and the overlap was wasted, if you know what I mean).

As we run down Shoal Creek, and we’re getting close to the eight mile marker, he’s able to call out to several of the spectators by name. Or at least, by their kid’s names. Several times, he tells them that its “Clark’s dad” running, and they wave and cheer. That’s one of the wonderful things about the race, every cheer is a boost for every runner, no matter what name is called. He strips off the long-sleeved shirt to toss to his wife, who is waiting at what turns out to be the eight-mile water stop: its literally in his front yard. He takes a minute to chat, I stretch out my calf muscles. I was going to do more work on my ITB, but he heads off and I decide that I like the company better than the stretch. My knee is obviously feeling quite a lot better now than it was at mile five, or I wouldn’t have even considered that.

Mile 9 - 10:56
Down Shoal Creek we go, enjoying the scenery. It doesn’t get much traffic, and tends to fill up with garbage after heavy rains, but even so its much more inspiring than the industrial park an hour before. Just chatting, and running, enjoying the beautiful day. About halfway through, I pulled over to the side for some more ITB stretching, and watched Craig head off into the distance. Its a pity to lose such a conversational companion, but my knee just won’t let me run though things like I used to. As I head off, renewed, I run for a couple of minutes and see Marcus and Jason in the distance at the waterstop. Very cool.

Mile 10 - 11:38
I pull up next to the guys, happy to take a minute or so to rest. I ask Marcus if he has some Advil for me, and he says that he doesn’t but that Stephanie will be around in a couple of miles. That’s fine. He does have Gu and M&Ms, neither of which I need. Ah, well - its still good to see them both. I’m stretching while we talk, of course. When I’m done, I head off into the crowd at a fun, fast lope - at least for a few hundred feet. Seeing my friends just gives me a great boost, and I’m really glad that they’re around.

There are some wonderful signs, and I’m starting to recognize people who are out there on the course for the second or third time today. I’m trying to wave and grin, and say “Thank you,” to the crowd whenever I think of it. They’re all bundled up against the cold (which feels fine to me, since I’m running), and they’re out here supporting us anyway. Go crowd!

At some point along here I caught back up to Craig and one of his friends from Motorola, but lost him again for good the next time I needed to stretch.

Mile 11 - 11:11
We’re on Duval, heading South. This feels good. Hmm. A porta-potty with a short line. Time to pull over, and do some calf-stretches while I wait, bouncing up and down so I don’t cool off too much in between. The gal before me bends to retie her shoe just as the door opens, so she lets me go ahead. Ahh… that’s the downside of hydration, I guess. Feeling much better, I get back into traffic right as Eliza is passing. Go Eliza! She seems to be doing pretty well, a little slow but very evenly paced.

Mile 12 - 12:22
I can see the street numbers ticking down, and I’m reminded of the 25K that we did as a group where we went from the boat docks up to 31st (or so) in about two miles. That means I must be getting close to downtown! 43rd, 42nd, 41st… I remember that my in-laws are going to be watching for me, so I’m counting backwards until I get to 34th street (where they live just a couple of blocks west). Wait a minute! There’s my Dad and stepmom at 38th with a great “The British are Coming!” sign, complete with flags. I stop and stretch, chat for a minute, and head off again. Its wonderful that people are willing to stand out in the cold for me, even if I can only give them a minute of my time (and that’s more than I would have done if I didn’t need to stretch so much, to be honest).

36th, 35th, 34th…. 33rd… where were my in-laws? I run over ten miles, and they can’t go a couple of blocks? Hmph. Oh well, on with the race. I hear my name, and look behind me - there’s Anthony! What the? I thought that I was the last monkey, especially since Eliza got ahead of me when I saw my Dad and stopped to say hello. We’re all congregating here before the half.

32nd, 31st, 30th… there they are. Carol is holding up a big “Go SockMonkeys!” sign, which gets a lot of cheers. Now I feel really bad for getting annoyed at them, but I’m not at my most logical at this point. More stretching (this is feeling pretty good by now), and I pick up another Gu and another handful of Advil. The rest of the team has moved on by the time that I get going again, but I’m feeling much better for all the stretching I’ve done in the last fifteen minutes.

Looking at my time for this mile, I must have been running comfortably at a sub 10:00 pace (which I should be able to do, were I not injured) considering how much stretching and chatting I did.

Mile 13 - 12:02
I’m seeing a lot of half-marathoners struggling at this point. We’ve got a couple of small uphills, but they seem large because they’re the only significant ones on the front half of the course. So I try to cheer them up as much as possible with things like, “Everything you spend here you get back on the other side.” Its empowering to think that I’m going to be running twice as far as they are, to be honest, and also more than a little daunting. The hills are actually nice to run up, as the shorter stride is a lot easier on my ITB and I’ve got plenty of power in my calves. Easier, but not easy - I’m still stopping to stretch at least once per mile.

Mile 14 - 12:20
Right after the 13 mile marker we start seeing signs for the half-marathoners to go left. You can hear Evil in the distance being his usual ebulliant self. And there’s no water stop. Damn. Still, its fun to run past the finish line, cheering on all of the half-marathon winners. After the chute, I continue to cheer as I run past the corral, yelling, “You did great!” and other inanities. I don’t know if anybody heard me, but it felt good to be able to do it. There’s the water stop! Just past the end of the line. I pull off to the side, get my PowerAde, and do more stretching. I bump into a Marissa, a fellow sockmonkey, and we walk for a couple of minutes, discussing our race so far, then break into a reluctant trot that becomes, for me at least, a surprisingly comfortable run.

Now we make a couple of turns, and suddenly we’re running down Congress. I turn around, just for a second, and sure enough there’s the capital behind us. Very cool. I start pointing out the place I ate dinner the night before, my office building, et cetera. Not that I think she cares, but it makes me happy to be running somewhere that I know so well. I think that traffic is flowing on the Northbound side of the road, but I don’t remember - its amazing how many details like that that didn’t matter to the race just got filtered out before they hit my brain.

Mile 15 - 12:09
And who do I see as I come up to the corner of Congress and 6th but my good buddy Marcus! This is so cool. He calls out to Jason as I slow down to a walk and grab some more PowerAde. I probably did some stretching as well, but don’t really remember - I was feeling better now than I had in a while. Jason comes up, and we head off West together. He was going to run with me for the next six miles until mile 20, at which point he would hand me off to Marcus. Do I have great friends or what?

Going down 6th, we start chatting about the race. He tells me that I look much better now than I did at mile six when the gang first saw me. I was quite a bit behind some of his friends doing the half then, and I’d almost caught up to them by the time I saw da guys last at mile ten. Who knows, I may have helped some of them up the San Jacinto hills. This is when I find out that I looked like I was in a world of back at mile six - which, considering that I’d stopped to stretch before hand so that I would look fresh, was not encouraging. But I was much better now.

Mile 16 - 12:46
We come up to another waterstop and I slow down to walk through it. Jason’s telling me not to let him push my pace. I replied that it was okay if he pushed it a little, that was what he was there to do after all. We took off again, running around 10:30 - maybe a little faster - which felt damn good. The conversation took my mind off my knee again, and I was really enjoying the day. The weather had warmed up quite a bit, and it was wonderful when the breeze was going but a little too warm when it stopped. I discussed asking Stephanie for my short-sleeve shirt when I saw her next, but decided that it would be too much of a hassle. It was strangely fun watching Jason stretch his calves when I took my ITB stops, since he’d only been going a mile or two - we may have to do a half hour of stretching together at some point so that I can pass on some of this AustinFIT pre-run knowledege.

Mile 17 - 11:32
Speaking of Stephanie, there she was just past the sixteen mile marker. I got some more Advil, and asked for a Gu, but she told me that she only had the one and that I was scheduled for it in two miles, at the eighteen mile marker (across the street at Mangia). Fair enough. It was great to see her anyway. Jason had gone into a store to use the restroom, but I took off rather than waiting for him figuring that he’d either catch up, or not - but since this was the out and back, I’d see him either way. A quarter mile later, I was getting a little inconvenienced myself and waited at a dual porta-potty, but whoever was in them had some serious problems and was just taking too long. Time to run anyway, and I’ll go at mile seventeen. Or somewhere.

Jason caught up to me pretty quickly, since he’d given up waiting at the gas station and we just ran along together. We kept it up for another half mile, until he peeled off again to try another store - this time, with more success. Passed a 101X truck off to the right, with a bored driver playing annoying music at too quiet a volume to be really energizing, but too loud to ignore. Such a contrast from the RunTex truck on the way back in at Buda. Passed a guy with a propeller beanie who got “Great hat,” comments from everyone.

Coming the other way, I had seen Tanya about fifteen minutes ahead of me, then Anthony and a couple of other monkeys about halfway down the track. Craig was in there at some point, too, and Chris our AustinFIT trail leader. Then I saw the seventeen mile marker, with a big “U Turn” sign in the middle of the road. Ran down to it and looped around, over the timing strips to make sure that I did the whole distance. I made sure to hit the mats and listened for that beep - I wanted credit for every mile, after all.

Mile 18 - 15:37
No porta-potties. I see Jason coming back towards me, and he turns around as we pass the waterstop and I slow to a walk. Some bratty little kid on the side yells, “Hey, start running!” I’d like to see him out here doing what I’m doing today. Did I mention that there are no porta-potties? Screw this. There are some nice, thick trees off to the right, so I double-back and get in about a foot, then let loose. According to Jason I amused and surprised a couple of women who were passing - who must have been blind, since there had been people (men and women) relieving themselves all along the course.

Started to run, my knee stopped me with a sharp pain. Stretched it out again, ran, stopped, stretched, ran slowly … now its working. Got up to speed again. Phew - that was close. Coming up to the end of the mile, I see my lovely wife again. This time I take the promised Gu from her, and do some more serious stretching while a guy dressed as the Mangia dinosaur looks on with amusement. A wave goodbye, and we head out down the MoPac access ramp and across to South First street.

Mile 19 - 16:30
At least, I try to. That part of the road has a steep downhill banked turn, and my knee wasn’t having any of that. I stop and walk down, apologizing to Jason as I do so who tells me that I’m being stupid for apologizing to him for walking after having just run nineteen miles on an injured knee. He’s got a point. We pass Christopher, one of my AustinFit coaches, who’s walking and has a thin layer of salt on his face - seems like he has some ITB issues of his own. Then things get difficult.

I couldn’t really get going again after that walk. We ran for about a minute, and I have to stop and stretch. Then I try again - if anything, its worse than before the stretch. So more stretching. ITB, calves, ITB, hamstrings, ITB… only good for thirty seconds. I end up walking about five minutes, rubbing my hip hard to try to loosen up the muscle. While we walk, I tell Jason my story about running from signpost to signpost at Buda, and not even making it all the way to the next signpost near the end. Finally, about halfway of the way through the mile, I start a slow run with very short strides. Ah, that’s working. I bring it up to speed and begin to move along again. I was heartened by the fact that my 30K time was a good forty-five minutes faster than it had been at Buda, even with all the walking and stretching that I’d had to do. Still, got to press onward.

Mile 20 - 14:26
Needed a little more stretching here, but not a huge amount - nothing like the last two miles. When we get to the three-quarter point we see Anna and Kelly with a great sign (”Running shoes: $75, Entry fees: $80, Finishing: priceless.”) I happen to agree with that completely, and we keep going towards the waterstop. I mentioned to Jason that it was weird running on the street when I can see the trail that I’ve done so many miles on. He said that we could go over to it, but no - that wouldn’t be Right. I guess its something that you have to be doing the marathon to appreciate though.

Wow. Twenty miles. And there’s Marcus, and Stephanie! Jason peels off, Marcus picks me up. I wave to Stephanie as I go past, but don’t feel like stopping again - later, she said that she understood perfectly. She is wonderful, ya know. Anyway, I end up stopping a little afterwards anyway, to stretch my ITB again at a helpful lightpost. He tells me that he has another Gu for me whenever I need it, and the Advil bag. Off we go, and this time my ITB is behaving itself and we can start running, doing the start-slow-and-accelerate-gently method. Then Marcus goes and surprises me. Runs up ahead a little, and yells to the crowd, “Hey everyone - this is Richard’s first marathon! Let’s give it up for him!” And they do. Wow. Embarrasing, and wonderful. The crowd is especially thick here as well, since its right across the Congress Ave. bridge from the finish line. What a boost!

Mile 21 - 12:22
We take 1st street down to the I-35 frontage road, and turn South. This feels desolate. There are cars passing right by us on the left, used cars for sale in front yards on the right, and no crowd support whatsoever. I’m feeling that my pace has really suffered with my problems at mile nineteen, and having Marcus there to talk me through it with tales of his marathon is especially nice. I mention that considering my time at the twenty mile mark, my asperations of a five hour marathon are shot and that his 5:06 record is probably safe as well. He tells me not to worry about it. I’m not actually worried about it, which is funny - I’m just putting one foot in front of the other, hoping that I can nurse my ITB and keep running until the very end.

Two tenths of a mile into it, I made sure to note the fact that I was now into uncharted territory. My previous long run record had been 21.2 miles. This was likely to be my last record distance for quite some time. So that’s at least one PR set for the day - a good precedent.

Just before the waterstop, we pass a big archway with about five helpful people handing out Clif shots. I’m not about to try something new on Marathon morning, so Marcus just waves my Gu at them like a talisman to make them go away. Hey, it works, too. I take it away from him once we’re passed, suck it down, and toss it into one of the empty Clif boxes. Then we hit the waterstop for some more PowerAde to wash the Gu down.

Mile 22 - 13:58
We pass a band on the left who aren’t playing. Someone ahead of us must have said something, to which they replied (mic’d) that they’d been out there for three and a half hours. A quick check of my watch showed that I’d been running for four and a half hours. Sheesh. My heart bleeds. Then they started making fun of the hat that was running in front of me. Now, don’t get me wrong, it was a pretty amusing hat. Perched on top of a petite little runner, it was a great big fuzzy top hat in black and white leopard print. I have no idea how she didn’t pass out, but I’d been following it for a while. We passed her as her running mate was telling her that the band was giving her a hard time - she hadn’t even heard them. Hmm. Maybe she wasn’t that far away from heatstroke after all. Stopped and stretched, and the hat passed us again.

Mile 23 - 13:29
Passing the hat was becoming a common occurance. I was faster than a lot of the people at my current point, but I kept having to stretch my #$&@! ITB. Ah, well.

We started running some pretty solid uphills as we approached Longhorn Dam. Those felt good - my calves were doing alright and again they provided some relief for my knee. Looking around, some of the houses we were running by were really pretty, and it seemed that they had some good neighborhood pride. It might not be a bad place to find an investment property, come to think of it. I concened Marcus at one point though - the fans were sparse, but energetic, and I was yelling back to them as they cheered me on - they yell, I yell, they yell, I yell, et cetera. Then a dog barked, right in time to be my next supporter, and I barked back. Just having fun, but got a weird look anyway. Finally we saw another waterstop up ahead, as the road turned right to go over the Dam.

Mile 24 - 13:32
There’s Stephanie! And Jason! Yeah, baby. I did a little more stretching. Does it seem like I’ve done a lot of stretching? That’s because I did. Anyway, a final “You’re looking great/I love you,” with Steph, and we’re off to the finish. Over the dam, which is covered in sand and crap from the snow that we had last night. The down the hill, careful to pace it but its not messing me up like the turn after eighteen did. Then on to the straightaway, turning right onto Lakeshore Drive.

I’ve got Jason on my left, Marcus on my right, and I’m feeling good. Well, maybe. Another stretch? Yeah, now I’m feeling good. We see Runnin’ Horn from the forum up on the right with a sign that reads, “Run like you stole something!” I can’t help but yell back, “Yeah, something really fuckin’ heavy!” We spend the next five minutes going through different permutations of this, including “Run like you’re being chased by a really fat, slow security guard,” and other refinements. I had to take a little more time and stretch out my quads.

Round about this time we passed the last set of timing mats, exactly 5K from the finish line. I was to do the last 5K in 35:01 according to the timing site. Now, that’s hardly a record, but that’s less than ten percent slower than my previous best 5K time before I started all of this training. And I’d already run twenty-three and a half miles. That’s something to think about.

One other things struck me as funny. At one point I was running and I saw a transformer up ahead, near a light post. I announced, “I’m going to stop, stretch my IT band, my quads, my IT band, my calves, and my IT band.” Got some odd looks, but I was having to plan things like that otherwise I’d forget something. I guess that this many miles of running does funny things to you like that.

Mile 25 - 13:38
This was the last, real uphill of the race. Running up Lakeshore towards Riverside, then up Riverside to I-35. As we ran, I noticed a semi parked on the side of the road and remarked, “Hey, I’ve stretched on that semi before!” I had, it was there on the 21 miler and came in handy. This time, I didn’t need it. Of course, that’s because I’d stretched a bunch coming up to it. I was also running on the street and not on the trail, so I got to see the left side of it for a change. Up the hill we go, turning right, and … up the hill some more.

I’d pushed my sleeves up a mile or so ago, but it the heat was getting to me anyway. I mentioned that I was beginning to feel a little dehydrated - just a little, but noticably. Marcus said, “I’m on it,” and took off at a faster pace (maybe 9:30?) for the next waterstop. What service! He got me a cup of water, which I drank first, and a cup of PowerAde. I took another full PowerAde when I got to the waterstop a minute later, and Marcus grabbed two more. This was the last waterstop. Let that sink in for a minute. The last one. I was almost there!

Mile 26 - 11:58
My knee started hurting me again, but like Hell I was going to stop at this point. It was just a dull throb at first anyway. I took a PowerAde from Marcus, but said that I didn’t want the other one - too hard to drink on the run, and I’d started running again. We were well over I-35, and heading towards the finish. I passed up the beer stop, but the guys each had one for me - bleah, smells like Bud Light, glad I didn’t get one.

The cars were pretty solid to my left at this point, crawling slowly forward. I start running next to the cones, sometimes in the traffic lane when the cars are stopped, trying to get as close to the road crown as I could to save my knee. As we headed towards Congress, I asked Marcus where the finish line was. He told me just to get to Congress. I asked again, and he said, “Just get to Congress.” Fine. As we get closer, I see the crowds really start to thicken. There’s Anna and Kelly up ahead!

Mile 26.2 - 1:53
At this point, I’m coming up on South 1st. Congress went by in a flash as I was watching the crowd cheer on their favorite runners. Marcus says something, but I’ve started to get tunnel vision. I wave my hand, mutter, “Yeah, fine, whatever,” to him. I don’t want to look at him, because I’d run that way. All I can think about is finishing. He understands, and peels off to meet Anna. Jason kept pacing me, cheering me on. I know he meant well, and I heard it all, but I’ve got it from here. Really, I have. Past the light, a little further. Lots of crowd noise. And there’s the chute!

I start trying to guage how much I have left in me. Pick it up a little - maybe a 10:00 pace. I see Stephanie off to the left. And then I get passed, and passed fast like I was doing to people at the end of the Turkey Trot. Screw that! Off I go, arms pumping, running up a storm - 9:00 at least, maybe faster. Wow. Going anerobic. 8:30 or faster. My knee, the crowd, forgotten. I can see Jason and Stephanie in my peripheral vision, then I don’t care. Just keep running. Faster. Passing more people. I see the finish line ahead, just a straight shot in. Then about 20 feet from the end, my fingertips and cheeks start to tingle, and I feel really light headed. Must be from the sprinting. Don’t care. Keep running - can fall over at the end if I have to. Besides, if I slow down now, even a little bit, I might fall over anyway. Look up. Smile. Was there a camera? One mat down. Keep going… almost there… Second mat past.

Stop. Stagger. Smile. Grin. I’ve done it. 26.2 miles in five hours, twenty four minutes. Its amazing. I’m weaving. I get offered at least three medals by different volunteers before I stagger over and pick one up. Put it on. Damn, that feels good. Down the exit chute. I see the sign directing yellow chips one way and black chips the other, but get it backwards and have to be helped out by a kind volunteer. Past the medical tent, trying not to stagger when they’re watching. There’s Jason. And Stephanie. And clothing pickup. I’ve done it!

I am now a Marathoner. One of 4,900 who accomplished the insane right alongside me. And I feel every bit as proud even though I shot past my time goals. I still did it. From the guy six months ago who could barely run two miles without stopping, who couldn’t run a 5K without two walk breaks, to this.

You know what? I’m still smiling.

Calories consumed: 800 (PowerAde and Gu)
Calories burned: 3,600
Medals won: 1
GPS Log

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