My Legs Hate Me

Today was the Carlsbad Half Marathon - the event I've been dreading ever since I've stopped training back in mid Dec. For three weeks while we got married, went on our honeymoon, and had vacation, I did not run or exercise, as a consequence putting on 4-5 lbs of pure guacamole and micheladas (mmm). Since coming back from vacation, I've run 6 miles tops when I should be running 8 or 10 or even have attempted a 12 before the race. Suffice it to say, I knew this race would be painful.

That being said, I still dutifully carbo loaded last night at Buon Appetito. We went with our parents and Kevin who was running the Carlsbad full marathon and ate our fill of delicious pasta and tiramisu. Stuffed beyond belief, I went to bed at 10 but tossed a bit from nerves, even waking up at 4am all amped to run (until I realized it was 4am). Finally, we woke up at 5:10am and by 5:30, I was dressed with two pieces of toast in my belly, one with honey and one with an incredibly sour strawberry jam. We picked up Sophie in Carmel Valley and Ryan dropped us off in Carlsbad around 6:15ish. As an aside, Sophie and I got incredibly lost in Carlsbad yesterday when we went to the expo to pick up our bibs and goodie bags. Thank goodness we did that trial run so race day transportation went smoother.

Freezing in our bitty shorts, Sophie and I took refuge in the large tents and hung around for thirty minutes, nervous but excited. After several Porta Potty trips, we bumped into Cindy, Dave, Juliette, Cisco, and Jim before heading to the start line. Once the gun went off and our wave made it to the start, we took off at a healthy 10min/mile start. It was hard for us to resist the urge to run out faster but we knew it was the smart thing to do so we just tried to focus on keeping an easy relaxed pace. By this time, the sun was coming out a bit and it was indeed a very pleasant day for a run. At mile 4, we ate our Gu but unfortunately Sophie's knees were starting to bother her so we ended up separating. Having lost my pacing buddy, I began to run at sporadic speeds which I recognized but irrationally ignored. It didn't help that the marathoners were running back on the opposite side of the road so I was unwisely motivated to pick up my speed. Everything was fine until I hit a couple hills at mile 6 and 8. I walked a bit on those but tried to get back to running as soon as possible. By mile 10, I was TOAST. I was about 2 minutes ahead of my goal time and somehow I thought my body would magically ignore the abuse I was putting it through and let me continue on. No no, I completely lost steam on those last three miles, my pace falling to ~10:30. I watched my wonderful lead trickle away with only mild regret as I was in too much pain to care at that point. Thankfully, at the last half mile Outkast's BOB came on the iPod (well planned by me) and I was able to push for the finish. In the end I came in at 2:09:45 according to my chip time which is 9:54min/mile pace. Just made it under my goal time :).

After the race, it was a completely zoo. Imagine about 8,000 people just milling around. It was crazy. I called Ryan and met up with our parents and Kim who came to cheer us on and Kevin who unbelievably finished the marathon in 3:26 with absolutely no training (what a sicko). Unfortunately we couldn't find Sophie so we went to Borders which was our safe meeting place in case we got separated and found her already waiting there. Tired and ready to go home, we piled in the car...and just sat there. There were cars lined up as far as the eye could see and none of us was moving an inch. After about an hour just sitting in the same spot, we decided to park and go into the mall for some grub. Ryan was anxious to still make his soccer game at 12:30 so he took every opportunity that he could to look at the window for moving cars. Luckily by the time we got Subway sandwiches, the traffic cleared up a bit so we were able to head home and Ryan still played the second half of his game. After devouring my sandwich and showering, I took a wonderful and much deserved nap.