After running 40-miles, it might make sense to detail how difficult it was. Then again, I doubt that would be news to anyone. So a different approach seems to make sense.
Everything leading up to the start of the run was fairly normal. Big pasta dinner on Friday. Rest and more carbs on Saturday. Kids fighting going to sleep keeping me up way later than planned. Waking up at 3 a.m. for breakfast and stretching.
When I got to the park where the race ends, there were already several people getting out of cars. As I headed to the actual finish line, a couple of them pointed out that the shuttles were "over there." I let them know I had my own plans for getting to the start.
The first song that came on my MP3 player was "The Black Parade" by My Chemical Romance. Given I was started a very long route and it was quite dark, it fit well. It was very surreal starting a race without thousands of others around me. I quickly settled into a routine of run, walk, look for arrows on the road (there were no route markers for the "first" five miles or so.
From there, with the limited exception of the 13 minute break between finishing the first half-marathon and the start of the official race, it was just a run. Long and arduous, yes, but still just a run. The roughest part was probably from miles 31 to 33. The coolest part was around mile 23 when a fellow Tri Fox cheering the runners ran alongside me yelling, "This man is running FORTY miles, today."
Here's a few things I took away from the day:
First, starting a 40-mile run on my own caused none of the pre-race excitement/jitters commonly felt. I did, however, experience them at the start of the actual marathon.
When you are running an ultra-marathon as part of a race, there's a great deal of anonymity. Other than a few aid-station workers who might have wondered what I was doing, only those familar with me knew what was happening. To anyone at the start of the race, the end of my 13.8 mile run looked amazingly like a pre-race warmup.
"Crazy" is a relative term. Most people look at marathoners as quite remarkable. Increase the distance to 40-miles, and those truly remarkable marathoners become the ones talking about "crazy" feats. And I think that someone who would run 100 miles in a single workout is the lunatic.
All along the race course I found myself ready to help anyone who looked distressed. Whether it was a gel, a bit of moral support, or someone to walk with, the desire to see everyone succeed outweighed any need to break the anonymity of the day. Many were completing their first full distance marathon, and that was more important than anything I was doing.
Talking about your goals with others can have amazing results. One of my co-workers was talking with an editor at the local paper about the race, and shared that I would be running the marathon as part of my 40 mile day. The results of that discussion can be found here. (When I get a chance, I'll scan the actual article and picture).
At the end of the day, I was successful. I completed the 40 mile run, and was extraordinarily close to my target of 10-minute miles. Using a 5-minute run, 2-minute walk interval, I finished in a total time of 6 hours 42 minutes. And two minutes difference over 40 miles is pretty minor.
And just for the record, the rest of the day was more challenging then the actual race. We took the kids to a local church picnic, and I spent the afternoon chasing them around. When I finally sat down, my feet wanted to give me a kiss.
RSS Feed