White Rock Marathon

I arrived in Dallas in time to meet up with my running group at the Expo, plus a friend I met at Cancun 70.3 who was also running. After making the rounds & buying some stuff, we headed off for a quick tour of the 1st 8 miles of the course since it was mostly uphill. From the car, it didn't look too bad, but we noticed the narrow streets. This would turn out to be interesting with the fulls and the halfers on the same course at the beginning. Then, we headed to the hotel & met up for dinner at one of my favorite restaurants in Dallas, Patrizio's.

Then we headed back to the hotel & prepped for the morning. In the anticipation of running my first marathon & replacing all my memories of my life in Dallas, I did not sleep a wink on Saturday. Not. A. Second. I got into bed, exhausted, and closed my eyes, but all the thoughts swirling in my head, periodic looks to the clock, etc. didn't allow me to even doze off even once. Definitely not good.

Got up early to go walk around outside & get a feel for the weather: warm & windy. Then back up to the room to get ready for the run, stretch my calves & IT bands & load up the car. I saw Gareth running around in the parking lot. Then my parents took me, Panther & Gareth over to Victory Park. After hitting the johns, we then met up with Fitty & David for some nervous banter. A few hugs, handshakes & well-wishes, then it was time to line up in our corrals and/or with pace groups.

I got a nasty side stitch early in the race, which never happens to me, and by the time that finally went away we turned to go around the lake. The headwinds, gusting horribly around 36mph around the lake, were tough. At top gusts, I decided to walk, since trying to run through those was futile, with one hand on the head keeping the hat from blowing off (which it did about 5 times). One of my contact lenses blew completely out of my eye and landed on my cheek. A nice fellow runner with some eye drops stopped & helped me by blocking the wind so I could clean my lens & put it back in my eye. The wind was making my eyes water and it was so full of salt that my lenses were all fogged up. It was also warm, near 72 degrees, so sweat almost immediately turned to salt on the skin.

At mile 14, my legs started cramping pretty badly, and I was almost out of salt tabs, which I had been taking regularly with my eGels. Decided to just grin & bear it & keep shuffling forward. I walked part of mile 17 with my parents, and had to cry a little bit. I was really in pain, and emotional about a lot of things, and I am so thankful they were there. I saw them 5 times along the course, and they cheered me on.

With less than a mile to go, I saw Panther, David, Gareth, and my friend Rodrigo, and they all ran me in. I cried and laughed, and pulled out everything I had (which wasn't much) to push through to the end. I am so thankful they were there, cheering for me, allowing me to feel good about myself & encouraging me, recognizing my hobbling and unsteadiness in the finish corral and clearly seeing I endured a lot of pain on that course. And I'm not even sure how, but it seems I passed 156 runners in the last 10K. And all of my teammates did well with 4 PRs, and 2 BQs. Gareth even managed to PR/BQ after being hit by a truck on the course!

Today, I can barely walk. And I can feel in every muscle how lopsided I probably looked toward the end of the race. I think my triceps are probably the only muscles that do not hurt. But all that said, I absolutely loved this marathon experience, and will carry with me the memory and significance of this race with me forever.

Thanks to everyone who supported me in various ways over the last few months, and sending me well-wishes in my final days & even the morning of. Thanks to Panther for being my friend and leading such an amazing group of thoughtful athletes. I'm glad you encouraged me to not have a time goal for my first marathon & told me to just take in the whole experience. I can save time goals for any other run, and this one didn't need that to make it a memory of a lifetime. Thanks to my fellow athletes who waited FOREVER for me to finish & ran with me in the end. You are a great group and I'm so lucky to know each one of you. I feel a very cool bond with the Dallas runners.

And now I'm officially a member of the club.