Race Recap: Chicago Marathon!

Wow, wow, wow. I'm still flying high on the endorphins (yes, endorphins!) from Sunday's race.

At the end of the race, with my #1 fan. ;)

This year's experience was so totally different than my experience in 2006. I didn't train very well that year, and didn't truly understand how hard it would be. In 2006, by mile 20, I was so emotional that seeing a little girl cheering her heart out made me start sobbing; by mile 23, I couldn't really form coherent phrases anymore, and by mile 24 I would jog for 2 blocks only to fall back to walking a minute later. It was rough; the 2006 marathon broke me. I finished, in 5 hours, 37 minutes and 36 seconds, and I was proud of myself, but I was absolutely miserable and swore that I'd never do it again. My only claim to fame was that I managed to beat the oldest man to run that year (82 year old Arturo Guzman) by 2 minutes.

Fast forward to this year. I trained really well from May through the beginning of September, which is difficult enough with a baby/toddler...but then when I started working again, that's when it started to feel impossible to fit everything in. I skipped or shortened some midweek runs, only did 14 miles instead of the traditional 20 miles three weeks before the race, and then managed to injure my calve muscles so badly two weeks before the race that I had to take an entire week off of running. On Saturday, when I did a little 2 mile run just to warm up, I had a nasty cramp in my quad on my right leg. So when Sunday morning rolled around, I was truly unsure of my ability to finish.

But along with the nervousness was a fair amount of excitement, and I definitely felt such a huge wellspring of support from my friends and family...my brother Daniel drove in from Cincinnati for the race, we had a tasty carb-loading dinner from my Dad and Kathy (Wits End Catering, y'all! Check them out!), and so many friends wished me good luck via this blog, email and Facebook. So I crossed the starting line with a smile on my face. I first saw some familiar faces just past mile 4 in front of LaSalle Street Church, but was distressed when I ran up and tugged on the (unexpectedly) locked doors to the front of the church building, as I was planning on getting rid of all of the coffee/Gatorade/water I'd ingested that morning in their nice clean bathroom! Oh well. Savva was waiting for me just before mile 5, and he gave me a bite of bagel, some Chapstick, and a big hug before I tasked him with finding me some sunglasses (I'd dropped mine accidentally when taking off my sweatshirt while running) and then ran off. At mile 7.5 I saw a friend that I used to work with at Lake View, and then at mile 9.5 a family that I used to babysit for when their kids were little. High fives all around! Just past mile 10, there was Savva again, along with Lisa and Daniel. Check out the cool new sunglasses.

My peeps make the awesomest signs.

I was still feeling strong, eating a few Clif Shot Bloks (these sorta jelly gooey carb things) and walking through all the water/Gatorade stations for little breaks. Just after mile 14, I remembered why you're never supposed to wear gear that you haven't previously worn on a long run - my cold weather running tights were starting to chafe. And right then, at that moment that I realized that it was beginning to hurt, I looked up and saw on the side of the street...a man in a gorilla mask holding a pot of Vaseline out for the runners. Perfect! And strange.

I next saw my cheering crew at mile 16, and my legs and feet were definitely starting to hurt. I got some ibuprofen from Savva's magic backpack of necessary things, slapped a bandaid on one spot on my shoulder that was chafing, and set off again into the sea of people. In Pilsen, around mile 19, I came upon my Dad, Kathy and their beloved dogs waiting for me with a beef taco and some wonderfully warm and sweet coffee. Some may say that beef is not the ideal marathon food, but now I must respectfully disagree.

When I hit 20 miles with my mood still good, my thoughts still coherent, and my body merely aching rather than screaming in pain, I started to have this wonderful, incredulous but ecstatic feeling that I would actually be able to finish and it wouldn't be so so so bad!

Just before Chinatown, after mile 21, I saw Savva and Lisa again - Savva then headed to the finish and Lisa jumped in to run with me. We chatted, and I told her about some of the funny signs I'd seen: "I don't do marathons...I do a marthoner," "Hurry up, the Bears game starts at 3," "Worst Parade Ever" and "Go Wunners, Go!" with a picture of Homestar Runner. I was definitely getting pretty tired at this point, and ugh, it hurt, but Lisa kept me going to mile 23 when she jumped out and Daniel jumped in. This is tradition, now, as last time he also ran me in for the last three miles. The only difference was that last time I was going so slow that he just speed walked next to me, and this time he had to jog. He almost made it to the finish line, but just like last time he got kicked out before the turn onto Columbus because he didn't have a bib number.

So before I knew it, I spotted Savva on the sideline just 200 meters from the finish and gave him a huge hug and kiss before sprinting towards the finish line, grinning like a maniac. I did it!!!

At the end, I met up with Mom, and Danny again - here's a few pics:

With my beloved Mommy

And my awesome little bro

So I finished in 5 hours, 18 minutes and 55 seconds, improving my time from 2006 by over 18 minutes! I had to check, of course, how the oldest man did - this year, it was an 85 year old gentleman and he took 6 hours and 45 minutes, so I totally swept him and kept that particular win streak alive. Just out of curiosity, though, I then checked to see how the oldest woman did, and found this:

Yes, that's right - not only did the oldest woman to run yesterday finish about 50 minutes faster than me but 5 out of 10 of the women in the 70-74 year old age group beat me by at least 25 minutes! I guess I still have some work to do on my running. :)

All in all, it was an amazing day and I am so glad I did it, and I may even want to do it again! Thank you to all those who have supported me, whether by coming out to cheer, praying for me, getting me a card and an AWESOME Chicago Bears cookie (thanks, Latin colleagues!), or giving donations towards the nonprofits in the Year of Racing Slowly project. You are all appreciated so much!