At 8:30 am tomorrow morning I will toe the line at my first full marathon. It's been a long, hard road getting here. I've nurtured more than a few minor injuries along the way, endured multiple cortisone injections in my right hip and even had a pacemaker implanted on 12 August to correct an irregular heartbeat. I've had to sacrifice a lot of hunting time to make this happen. When the Saturday long-mileage training runs get in the 15 to 22 mile range, most folks are finished for the weekend. I am one of those folks. You just don't feel like hiking in or climbing that afternoon or the next day. Then there are the other three runs during the week: Speed work sessions on Monday and Wednesday and an easy run on Thursday. All of that doesn't leave a lot of time to hunt. Two weeks ago this past Tuesday I ran the longest training run of the program, which was 22 miles. I've been tapering since then. My stomach is in knots and I'm very nervous. I know what's coming and I'm filled with both excitement and apprehension. Anyway, I wanted to say thank you to everyone on here who donated. I'll say it one more time: You people are awesome!
Good luck. Relax. You have done your part for all of this and trained hard. It will pay off. Just pace yourself and don't push to hard just be determined and finish.
Good luck man, remember first reading this was your goal and now for it to be here pretty cool. Sent from my SM-G900R4 using Tapatalk
I hope you had a blast! I'm sure your in some pain this afternoon, looking forward to hearing how you did!
Sorry to take so long to reply, guys. It's been a crazy two days. I did it. I ended up finishing in 4:51, which was quite a bit slower than my original goal when I started training in January. But then, I've had to take three major breaks in training. Two for hip injuries that were treated with cortisone injections and then the four week break from 12 August to 12 September for the pacemaker implant. The 22 mile training run I did on 22 November left me with significant knee pain so I only managed to log 11 miles in the 2.5 weeks before the race. Still, I went into this knowing that I would be very happy to finish in under 5 hours. I achieved that and I'm very happy about it. Here's a post-race pic of me, my wife Beth on my right and her best friend since grade school, Donna Curtis. Donna flew in from Victorville, CA to run the half marathon with my wife. It's the only pic I have at this point. Incidentally, does anyone else know what it feels like to down three draft beers after a marathon? It's freaking awesome. :D
Awesome, way to get it done even after injuries. I know how it feels to down multiple drafts after a 5k probably about the same since I don't run what so ever. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That is a tremendous goal to achieve. I have huge respect for that kind of dedication. Really cool that you were able to keep pushing through and make it happen. Congrats! I only know how it feels to run to the beer fridge and slam a few.
