Seattle Marathon Post Race Review

Morning Wake-Up Call: My husband and I stayed over at my parent's house so we could drive to the race together. I woke up at 5am. Had my coffee and an egg and bagel sandwich. It was hard to eat because my stomach is always so upset on race days, but I knew I had to eat the whole thing. I'm glad I did.

Off to the Races: The traffic wasn't too bad and we got to the race at 7:15 with an hour to spare. The weather wasn't too bad. A little misty, not too cold.

There They Go: I was feeling really good about this race. I knew it would be hard, but I didn't know what was in store for me a few hours after the gun went off. Our plan was to stick to the 4:45 pacer group, it was a great plan until my knee started to hurt. We also trained using a 4:1 run/walk interval. But we wanted to not stop at the beginning, it's too hard to do that with so many people around and it's too exciting. We stayed with the pacer group up until about mile 7. It was a perfect pace, I wish I could have kept it up.

Mile 13: "If I signed up for the half, I'd be done!!" The first words out of my mouth. I knew that my husband and aunt and uncle would be waiting for us here, so that got me more motivated. My knee at this point was killing me. I have been going to PT for my hip, and that didn't even hurt, but my stupid knee HURT. I am pretty sure it is due to my tight IT band.

It was wonderful to see my family at this point. I really needed it!

Miles 14-20: Didn't feel too bad, except my knee hurt. We were doing our intervals and we just kept running along. We both made potty stops. Boy did it feel good to sit down! Oh, yeah! The last half of the race was all hills. Steep hills, long hills and hills in between. I knew it would be hard but this just about killed me. And it really wasn't the going up part that was hard, the painful part was trying to run down them! OUCH!!!!

Miles 20-24: Hurting pretty bad at this point. Everything, my feet, my knees my hips. My PT says I am hyper mobile in my joints and I keep reading that running is really painful for those of us that are hyper mobile. I would like to trade bodies with a speedy runner to see if they hurt as much as I do!

Miles 24-26: The most difficult and challenging of the whole experience! I am so glad my mom was with me to keep me going. I kept crying because my knee hurt so bad and I just wanted to be done, I didn't want to go another two miles. My mom and I crossed the finish line together and I cried. I cried because I was glad I finished. I cried because I hurt so bad. I cried because I got to do this with my mom and not too many daughters out there can say that their 59 year old mom is a marathoner!!

As you can see in these pictures I look like I am in pain, I could not even force a decent smile!! I tried, but my smile muscles wouldn't work either!

Things I learned:

1. Moderate hills mean "there are lots of them, train for it!"

2. I felt great with my nutrition plan, didn't feel hungry once during the course. Definitely sticking to this!

3. I don't need to use walk/run ratios, just walk at the water stops every two miles.

4. Don't train using your own modified training plan, use a tried and true training plan, created by someone who knows what they are doing! ;)

5. You can do ANYTHING you set your mind to!

6. Even though I didn't meet my time goal, I still finished and the next marathon I do I will get a better time, because the course will be flat ;)

Overall experience: I had fun. I don't think I will sign up for this race again. Mostly because of the time of year. You can't depend on the weather. We really lucked out and it was perfect. It was a challenging course. If I do this one again, I have to work on hills!!