My First Marathon

Yesterday I ran my first marathon, The Bellingham Bay Marathon. This was the inaugural year for this event and overall I think they did a great job. Over 2000 runners registered to run. Most were running the half marathon, but I was one of the crazy ones. 379 of us ran the full 26.2 miles.

The race was to start at 8am near the waterfront. The wind was howling with gusts recorded at 44 mph. This caused nearly half of the porta johns to be blown over. Talk about a long line for the bathroom. There was a 100% chance of rain. We were off with the sound of an air-horn at a breakneck walking speed. It was a few minutes before people thinned out that we could actually run. I told myself that I was going to start off slow so that I wouldn’t burn myself up too soon. That plan was hard to stick to. So many people were passing me that I felt like I was running too slow. I have a Polar running computer (yes I know I’m a gadget guy) that showed my pace to be 8:30. My goal was to start off closer to 10:00. It wasn’t long though before we passed several of the people that had taken off too fast. Most of the course was on greenway trails. Which is much better than running on the street, but this made things a little crowded.

My wonderful wife who has supported my training so much was there to watch me start. She and a friend then drove off to meet me about 3 or 4 miles into the course to cheer me on. My friend Rick, who I have been training with, was running the half marathon. He ran with me till the split at 5.5 miles. Then I was on my own. Since the majority of the runners were running the half things thinned out a lot once we split. I kept seeing another runner that was running the whole marathon barefoot (OUCH!) And then as if a marathon wasn’t hard enough there was some gal that was singing and skipping as she ran. Rock on crazy girl.

The wind kept picking up, but I was sheltered being on the trail for most of it. I could hear trees snapping and branches falling. Well I could fix that. Just like when I was in high school and had a car that made weird noises. I just turn my music up louder.

At about 21 miles I was still feeling great. My friend Rick had finished his race, taken a break then backtracked to run the last few miles with me. This was a great boost. Everything came to a screeching halt when we were stopped by a train. We had to cross some tracks as part of the course and what seemed like the longest train was going by. I didn’t care so much about my time, but when I wasn’t moving my muscles were tightening up.

The last two miles were the worse. We had to go through a park on the water. The wind was directly in our faces. Salt water was being blown up over the wall into our faces. Salt water is not refreshing. It was like running up a hill going against the wind. As I approached the finish line I heard my name announced over the loud speakers as people cheered me on. Cool thing about running this race in my home town is seeing so many people that I knew throughout the course. M was there to help me get some warm clothes and some much needed food. Nice to hear her say how proud she is.

This photo shows me right after crossing the finish line. Can’t believe I’m still smiling. I finished with a time of 4:26:32. Average pace 10:10. I came in 169th place out of 379. Now I know this isn’t the fastest time in the world, but my goal was just to finish. Plus I beat Oprah. She ran a marathon in 4:29:20. Not bad considering 13 weeks ago I wasn’t running at all. I started my training with two laps around a track. I had to stop after two laps because I thought I was going to die.

Today I am sooooo sore! Walking is a chore. However I thought I would be hurting worse than I am.

I think my next marathon will probably be Portland in a year from now. I’ll work on improving my time. I’ll train the right way for the next one.

Some other great inspirations: Oldest runner 73 year old Eleanor Claus time 5:35:19. I also got beat by 70 year old Phil Damon time 3:56:58. I sure hope I’m so active at their age.