RACE REVIEW:OLD COLONY MARATHON

As you know, Boston was a bit of a shit show for me.  I'm not going to go into detail.  If you want to read that story, feel free.  But, I will tell you that afterwords, I was pretty bummed about the way things had played out.  I don't care how chill you are about your racing and results, even if you're one of those people who can claim you're "over it" after a bad race and play the whole "onwards and upwards" card, I don't believe you if you tell me there's not still a small part of you that's replaying the day in your head and wishing things had gone differently.  Regardless, I couldn't let it go.  And it had nothing to do with my time.  Yes, it was an unusually hot day and I suffered in the heat.  But, I couldn't help but wonder if it was more than that.  If maybe I just didn't "have it" anymore.  That maybe I can no longer run marathons at the level I thought I was capable of at this stage of my life.  I know this sounds very dramatic but having never had a breakdown of this magnitude in a marathon prior to this one, and I've run 32 of them, I was questioning things more than usual.  My teammates and friends began to ask me what was next.  Meaning, assuming you're moving on, when and with which marathon do you plan to try again?  Which normally is exactly what I'm doing; picking up the pieces and signing up for my next rodeo.  But this time was different.  I started to feel like I didn't want to wait until my next major marathon to see if I could string together a decent race.  I had all this training and I hadn't tapped into the bottom of the well at Boston.  So, I realized that I wanted to try again now, not six months from now.  I reached out to Jon, my coach, and shared my thoughts asking if he was on board.  In a nutshell, I told him I wanted a do-over.  That I'd found a random marathon on May 14th, a Tuesday, in driving distance and I really wanted to do it so I could get the crappy taste of Boston out of my mouth and some overall closure on my spring training.  He let me know that he wasn't against it as long as I was up for it physically and mentally and that I could honestly say I was doing it for fun and that it didn't feel forced.  He also suggested a different marathon primarily because the one I mentioned was fourteen 1.84 laps around a park which, let's be honest, sounds pretty brutal.  But, I couldn't get one done on a weekend because I have track meets through June so it was this one, the Old Colony Marathon, or nothing.  We agreed we'd ramp back up a bit, see how the body was handling it and get a couple workouts in and then make a call closer to race day. 

At the hotel.  Still not sure.

A couple days before the race I was still having my doubts.  Spring track is crazy and the meets are stupidly long.  I had been spending so much time on my feet and my overall fatigue was really high.  I was concerned I wouldn't have enough in the tank to even run a "mellow" marathon.  But, mentally, I was still leaning towards doing it and that was enough to keep it on the front burner.  I told my husband that the race started at 6:00am and it was an hour and a half drive out to Westfield so I'd have to get up at 3:30 that morning to make it work.  He was like, No, Rebecca.  That's crazier than the fact that you're even doing another marathon at all.  You need to stay out there in a hotel the night before so you don't have to get up that early.  Very grateful to have his voice of reason in my life.  So, Monday night after track practice I made my way out to Westfield so I'd have a notably less stressful morning on Tuesday.  Jon sent me a text that afternoon asking how I was feeling.  I told him that I honestly still wasn't sure.  I was still feeling a little beat down and was worried I'd blow up again which would totally defeat the purpose of this exercise.   He told me not to stress and reminded me that this was supposed to be for fun.  He suggested I wake up and make a game day decision.  And he told me not to feel guilty if it just didn't feel like the right thing to do.  So, that's what I did.

Ready or not.  Maybe not.  I don't know.

My alarm went off at 4:30am.  I had brought my own coffee machine (learned that lesson the hard way) so I sat and drank and debated for the last time.  I was a little scared for obvious reasons.  But I was also excited.  My gut was telling me to go for it and I decided to trust it.  

Trust my gut.  And coffee.

I finished my coffee and drove the fifteen minutes to Stanley Park where the race was being held.  It was a beautiful morning, nice and cool and not too humid.  Granted, it was still dark when I left but when I pulled into the park the sun was coming up and I was feeling cautiously optimistic.  

Rise & shine

It was now around 5:15am.  I found the race director and registered for the race.  That's right, registered.  This might be one of the only marathons in the country that you can sign up for on the actual morning of the race.  And given all of my uncertainty about doing it, I really appreciated this option.  The guy in charge told me to come back to the start about five minutes before 6:00am.  This might be one of the only marathons in the country that you can roll out of your car and up to the line five minutes before it starts.  The scene was about as mellow as it could get.  I used the bathroom, pinned on my bib, got organized and then waited in my car.  Around 5:50 I walked over to the start with the other 30 or so runners.  I recognized a guy from Lexington, Joe Caruso, who I always see running on the bike path and introduced myself.  He told me he'd also blown up at Boston and was there to try and qualify for 2024 as he'd run it for the past 12 years and didn't want to break his streak.  He asked me what my time goal was.  None.  I told him.  I just want to enjoy the experience and finish strong.  He got it.  We wished each other good luck.  It was time.

Directions: Follow the flour

The mile markers and arrows along the course had been made with flour.  So the race director went over the details one last time in case, you know, it rained or something and the flour faded.  You can't make this stuff up.  I couldn't help but laugh at myself at this point.  It was 6am and I was getting ready to run fourteen 1.84 mile laps around a park.  For fun.  Not a joke.  The race director looked at us and said, Ok, ready?  We all laughed as we nodded yes.  And with that, we were off.  Jon and I had talked about pacing around 7:15 per mile.  Not because I wanted to run a specific time but because I was coming off of Boston and I wanted to run smart.  The goal was to feel in control.  Zero stress.  My first mile clicked off at 7:08.  And I felt good.  So I locked in and let go.  No more watch.  Just me, my music, the 6 people that were watching and the 30 of us who were racing. 

All smiles

The miles ticked by and I just embraced the moment.  I pretended like each lap was a mile instead of 1.84 so in my mind, I had 14 miles total to finish.  This made those middle miles more digestible.  Sort of.  My mile paces, which I looked at afterwards, had all been between 7:05 to 7:30 except for my last one which was a 6:54.  I'd finished the way I'd hoped; freshly filled with joy and gratitude and with the much needed reminder that I do, in fact, love this distance.  The slate, if you will, had been washed clean.  Or as Joe put it after the fact, Boston had been expunged.  I was now ready to begin again knowing that I do love this sport and that, without question, it's worth it to keep going.  The bad races suck.  The really bad ones?  Those make you wonder.  But then the good ones?  Those are like the gifts that keep on giving.  This was a good one.  And time or place had nothing to do with it.  I'd told no one what my plan was.  I'd run alone.  I'd run 14 laps around a park.  And I'd honestly loved every minute of it.  So, yea.  Really good.  And now I can't wait to do it again.  Oh, and new post-marathon tradition.  Ice cream for breakfast.  Also really good.  Next up, TBD.  Stay tuned.

Ice cream FTW

Listen to this:

All We Need (Deep Inside) by AYYBO

AYYBO · All We Need (Deep Inside)