Chicas Terremoto: 26.2

Sunday, February 2, 2014

26.2

After much anticipation, today I finally ran the Miami Marathon. I am loosely using the word "running" though, as I was only able to run half of it and had to walk the rest.

Since it was already 76 degrees by the time we started running, I decided to run slower than my regular pace. I think that really helped, as I was asking my body to run in a much higher temperature than I ever faced in my entire training. The slower pace allowed me to keep running without issues until pretty much the 13th mile, but after that my leg started to hurt and cramp. I initially alternated between running and walking, but eventually settled for walking the rest of the way. It was either walking or having to quit. By mile 16 I was definitely in pain and had to sit for a while, trying to stretch, until the pain mostly went away. When I was sitting there I seriously thought "This is it, there is no way I am going to make it, somebody is going to have to come pick me up". But somehow I managed to keep going, and I even picked up the pace because I was so afraid they would take down the finish line before I could make my way there.

The funny thing is that my struggle had nothing to do with the weather, with feeling exhausted, or with being light headed, which I understand impacted many people on the race. My issue was purely with my legs. As I was about to cross the finish line I figured I could try to run the last few feet, but that just caused me to cramp once again, and barely cross the finish line. That sucked, but it also made me glad I didn't push it earlier by trying to run again.

The worst part of the entire Marathon was probably mile 16, and the best part was two-fold: 1) Seeing Gabi and my mom cheering me on, and 2) Hearing from Gabi that I was already in Mile 24 when I thought I still had 3 miles ahead of me. Even though I initially didn't believe her, that was definitely priceless!