This time last week we were nervously packing and getting things ready for
the start of our trip. Now that the weekend is over we are eager for another
event and are searching for more races to do before next year.
With our schedules we never take vacations so this is considered our
vacation....(what a vacation!!)
The week leading up to the race we had many more variables to deal with than
last year in our first ever marathon. Ticia was fighting the flu, she had
questions about her knee holding up, we were worrying about boarding our dogs
for the first time (last year Ticia's dad looked after them), the weather,
and me fighting something as well.
AND - Once again this year we did not train as much as we liked or we should
have/
Training is always tough for us as my career as an attorney keeps me at the
office all day into the night (who wants to run after 12+ hour days) and
Ticia's as a radiographer working the third shift at the hospital 3:30 -
Midnight - prevents her from running during the day as she has to sleep to
recover for her work day(night) - last year the longest run we were able to
do was 13 miles and we each did that once...crazy of course to think we would
even try to race but we managed to finish in 6:12.
This year we actually trained more with a few runs over 12 - but our longest
run was only once again 13.1 miles - a local half marathon race we did in
December.
So we drove up to Orlando on Friday.
As luck would have it we found a great brace for Ticia's knee at the Expo.
Neither of us were feeling that well and we tried a quick visit to MGM to
cheer us up. Bad move as it was freezing Friday night. We made it back to
Port Orleans hoping to catch the encounter but as it turns out I thought it
was later in the night and we missed everyone. We may have seen Charles and
his wife leaving - after looking at the pictures I am pretty sure it was
them. Since we arrived so late - we joked as to how we would know a "dead"
from any other resort guest as we did not see any bandanas.
Saturday we used the last day left on our annual passes to enjoy MGM - I
actually made it to the top 4 of the Millionaire game. Another marathoner
made it to the hot seat.
On Sunday we still did not know about the weather and we were way
over-prepared at the start b/c it was so cold last year.
We were both feeling ok and looked forward to a great race.
Our plan was to go for neg-splits and we started out on pace doing our 10/1
run/walk pace.
Things went pretty well - we kept to the plan and then the rains came...after
deciding that water logged sweats were not helping - we stripped out of these
outside of animal kingdom and tried to move forward.
Amazingly we kept to the plan even though we lost a lot of time in the rain.
I was disappointed to not hear the "just around the riverbend" singing from
last year (yeah right)
How many of you wish that the course would not wind through the back of
stinky Animal Kingdom?
We kept pushing on and I was hoping that Ticia would not say that her knee
was bothering her - she made it to 23 last year without the knee acting up
and we were fortunate this year - she thinks the brace really helped!
On the last stretch of the race we once again saw the guy with the medal
outside of MGM - I remembered him from last year and was happy to see him
again!
No knee problems and a last check of the watch kept us on track to finsh
under 6 hours - I did not want either time on the certificate to have a six
on it so we pushed and managed to finish at 5:58 and official time of 5:53.
A pretty nice improvement on last year with not much training - but just
enough to be able to reduce the time next year.
With our 10/1 plan in place we both think that we could have shaved much more
off the time and of course with more training we will improve.
After the race we were very sore - not injured but sore - and after a shower
and a nap we were up walking around (this did not happen last year as each
step was a struggle) and we are almost 100% now. We both had some back pain
I guess nothing unexpected.
Looking back we were more anxious this year after knowing what to expect at
the race and not knowing what to expect from us. I am proud of our finish
and time improvement and after picking up the dogs they seem to be fine too.
After saying that we are going to run the half next year and not put
ourselves through the full (about an hour after the race) we are back to
plotting for the full - As a new years resolution - we promise to train more,
post more and in posting more we hope that it will lead to training more
(makes sense I think).
So I wrap up this report looking forward to a change in the medal for the
10th anniversary - nice touch this year with the hanging 2002 - and the
running leading up to next years race!
I have a couple of thoughts that I will post later...
Jason & Ticia from South Florida
