WDW Marathon Day Two

Sooo... have you ever started out a day at 3:30 in the morning?

Well, have you ever started out a day at 3:30 in the morning when, with the local time change it really felt like 12:30 in the morning?

Well have you ever started out a day at 3:30 in the morning when, with the local time change it really felt like 12:30 in the morning on a day when you were going to run 26.2 freaking miles?

Didn't think so...

I could have kept going with that, but decided to stop there...

I've already explained how butt-numbingly cold it was that morning - literally when I stepped outside it was 17 degrees and windy - and that's not entirely what you want when you're running a marathon... in Florida...

(Sidenote: I knew it was going to be cold - I'm not a moron and checked the weather.com like the good Eagle Scout that I am - but the forecast called for temps in the low 40's... NOT THIS COLD!)

Now, there are two parts to cold running: the physical and the mental. The physical was cold - very cold - colder than I EVER REMEMBER BEING IN MY LIFE... But the mental was also cold. Allow me to explain...

See, after getting on the bus at 4:00 am, dropping off my return bag at baggage check, and then walking the mile or so to the start line, it was 45 minutes until the start of the race, which was officially 5:30 am... This was enough time to not only freeze my buns off, but also THINK about freezing my buns off - I always say the toughest part about running a marathon, other than the running part, is the anticipation of running - it can kill you...

So me and 30,000 of my closest friends whom I'd never met before huddled around each other in what would liberally be described as innapropriately-close relative proximity had we been in any other situation. As it was, no one though twice about it...

Now as I mentioned I am ready for a cold, not THIS cold, but A cold, wearing a shirt-sleeved technical shirt underneath a long-sleeved technical shirt underneath a fleece top, and running shorts underneath wind pants... Oh, and gloves... Not enough by half...

This it out of order, but here's a picture of me at around mile 15 - you can tell how cold it is from the fact that my sweat has FROZEN ON THE OUTSIDE OF MY FLEECE! Seriously? Seriously...

At any rate, the race got under way and off we went - normally in the cold, after a few miles you warm up and start to not really feel THAT cold... not so here... we started off and I felt like with each step my joints were going to break in half... kinda like near the end of Terminator 2 when the T-1000 gets frozen with liquid nitrogen and then breaks his leg off in pursuit of the Governator, Sarah and John...

And mind you, all this is happening at 5:30 am, in the pitch black...

in fact, the first two hours were practically in the pitch black - for me, that was more than half the whole race I ran in the sub-20 degree weather in the pitch freaking black... again, I was physically cold, but that darkness made it all the more mentally cold...

Anyway, after about two miles I am completely numb to the cold - I started out VERY slow (aroud 10:30 miles) in order to try to warm up before I pulled something... by mile four I started to feel like I could push it a little, and really revved up the speed... I was going really good there for a while, and when I looked at my watch I noticed I was going...

10:15? Ugh... it was going to be a long day...

From there I gradually got faster as my joints did their best French impression and gave up the fight, and I pushed on... I knew I wasn't going to hit my 3:40 mark that I wanted, but anything under 4:00 today would be just fine for me...

The sun finally came up around mile 14 or so, and it FINALLY shed some warmth on us - we went from the 17 degrees we were feeling to a toasty low 30's... At that point I ran a bit more and got nice and warm, then shed my pants at around mile 16, while I was taking my midway break, stretching, getting more fluid than normal, and eating one raspberry and one strawberry GU packet...

(Sidenote: mile 16 for me is key... that's the make-or-break- stop. Up to this point I had been hydrating like I should and eating my GU like I should, but I only carry Espresso flavored GU because of the caffeine (no, there's no coffee in it) and it tastes like it came out of the water underneath the Big Mountain Express... nasty, but effective...)

So at mile 16 I rewarded myself and spurred myself onward with fruit flavors and a little stretch break... And it worked cause I kept going, sans pants...

It was at this point that I noticed my right heel had become something of a problem... In the cold, I had not felt it open up and spew blood like Old Faithful, but this pic that I snapped after the whole thing speak to two things:

1. I was more numb than I thought, cause I didn't feel a thing

2. Nikes wick great

Now would probably be a good time to explain the marathon route - see, they tout is a run through the parks, and indeed you run through all four Disney parks, including the golf course, some cool hotels, around the lake, etc - but the majority of the run, just like any other marathon, happens on lonely highways, where no one can cheer you on... Maybe a mile in each park, and that's about it...

At any rate, we enter the final park, Epcot, with a little more than a mile to go... by this time, the parks have opened for the day and we are running through roped-off sections of the international part of the park - which is actually pretty cool because there were all kinds of people there to cheer us on - who had probably never seen a marathon before...

We get to mile 26, only 0.2 to go and what happens?? The course takes a right onto a backlot, where there is no one there, and then empties to the finish line for the last .05 miles...

Now, running in quiet for .15 miles may not seem like a lot, and comparatively I suppose it isn't, but after 20 miles, every tenth of a mile feels like you're running across the Grand Canyon, in quicksand, in Ugg boots, against the current... so to have the last .15 miles where no one can see you is disheartening - a lot of people started walking at this point because they just didn't have anything left, and since there was no crowd to feed off of or to make you swallow your pride, it's easy to give in... I didn't, but I can see how someone would...

At any rate, much to my surprise I crossed the finish line just

over 3:50, which I was more than happy with after that day... I got my medal, got my bag, went straight to the bus, hobbled to my hotel room, hobbled into a cold bath, hobbled up for a cold shower, hobbled down to the cafeteria and MUNCHED on my post-run reward...

MMMMMMMMM... Calories!

And the only thought going through my head was: man, there's only one problem with running the country's top ten marathons: you ACTUALLY HAVE TO RUN TEN MARATHONS...

Ugh, but now I have the Marine Corps, San Diego and WDW out of the way... just seven more!

Thursday, February 4, 2010