Big Cottonwood Marathon 2013

I did it!!! I qualified for the Boston Marathon with 6 ½ minutes to spare! This post will be longer than usual, so bear with me. We got up at 4:00 in the morning to get ready and drove down to get on the bus that was to take us to the start line. It wasn’t as cold as I thought it might be and it wasn’t raining, which was good because it had been raining all week and I was worried that I would have to go slower because I would slip and fall if I wasn’t careful. We were on our way up the course when we stopped because a bus had gotten stuck on one of the turns and we couldn’t get up the mountain. So we all had to get off the bus and walk around it to get up to where another bus was shuttling people back and forth. Of course after we had all been standing around for 15 minutes they got the stuck bus out of the way and we all got back on the busses who were now able to make it up to us. So the race actually started around 30 minutes later than it was supposed to. It was fine though. It was nice and cool all day, the temperature was perfect. Chris and I didn’t run together, I didn’t want him to slow me down and he didn’t want me to pressure him into running faster, but it turns out that he finished only about a minute behind me, so we probably could have run together after all. Anyway, I started off pretty fast. I knew that I was going to have to start off pretty fast and keep it up all the way through the canyon, it was my only chance of making it. For the first 19 miles, I ran sub 8:00 miles, which is amazing. I tried to be very mindful of my body, I was worried that since I had to start off so fast, I was going to burn out at the end, and I didn’t want that to happen so I kept close tabs on my breathing and the way my legs, feet and back felt to make sure I wasn’t in any pain. Things were going along great, so I kept it up and actually had my fastest mile at mile 13. Between mile 11 and 12, some really nice lady started talking to me. It was distracting, and nice to vent some of my feelings about wanting to qualify for Boston and she was very talkative herself, which was nice. She left me in the dust after about mile 14 though. At mile 17 we got out the canyon and the course started to flatten out. I was okay with that for a couple of miles and then I started to slow down. At about mile 19 or 20, I was hanging with the pacer who was going to finish at 3:25 but after mile 20 I had to slow down. I didn’t slow down a whole lot at mile twenty, but it was enough for me to lose him. I really started to get tired at mile 23. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. Luckily, Chris’ dad had agreed to support me through the race and I knew that I was going to see him at each mile and I didn’t want to disappoint him by walking so I kept going and only stopped at the water stations. At mile 23 I could feel my calves starting to get really tight and I knew that if I didn’t stop and stretch, I was going to start cramping up, so I stopped and stretched my legs for just a few seconds and then started right back up again. Luckily it was enough and I didn’t cramp up at all. The last mile and was able to go just a tiny bit faster. Mile 24 and 25 I was running over 9 minute miles but I was able to bring it back down for mile 26 even though it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. The last .2 miles was really exciting for me. I had been keeping an eye on my watch and knew that I had a good buffer of time so that I could slow down at the end and still qualify and for those last .2 miles I could see the clock and see that I was going to finish with more than 5 minutes to spare. When I finished, Mary found me and gave me a huge hug and let me know that Chris was just a minute or two behind me. I got to see him finish, his time was a minute slower than mine, so I still have bragging rights for a little while. I probably won’t be faster than him for very much longer. Then we found Chris’ dad and I got to thank him for helping me finish and accomplish my goal. It was the best feeling in the world and even now I can’t help but smile when I think about it.