Marathon

I´d like to thank everyone who donated money for service in El Salvador through my marathon. You are all the reason I finnished that dang 26.2 mile run. Allow me to explain my reasoning for calling it a ¨dang marathon.¨

Being addicted to my ipod I have seriously forgotten how to run with out music blasting in my ear. For about 5 months my head phones didn´t have a single problem. Then without any foreshadowing whatsoever, they stopped working... on the first mile of the marathon!!!!! I was so upset when this happened I could have hurt someone (fortunately I restrained this violent impulse). ¨Great,¨ I thought. ¨How in the world am I supposed to finnish this now?¨ For me Music = Motivation. Running with out motivation = hobbling in apathetic misery. You can see my problem.

Screw this. I´m just running a half marathon!¨...But then I remebered all the pledges that had been donated. I vacillitated in my decision to finnish the marathon or just call it quits for a couple of miles before finally deciding (with reluctant determination) that I was just going to have to endure to the end - to the very end. My reputation was on the line, too many people knew about it. It was either cross the finnish line or leave the country (OK I guess that was the plan anyways.)

Intinally my goal had been not just to finnish the marathon but to finnish with a decent time. That goal changed. ¨I´ll cross the finnish line, but I´m taking my sweet time about it,¨ I concluded bitterly. I certainly did take my time. I tried talked to people next to me (though they didn´t always seem to apreciate the company, for some reason they were concentrating on just running), I dipped my head in the river 2 of 3 times (A cop watched me do this and informed me that if I was thirsty they had water just a 1/2 mile down the road. ¨No, I just wanted to get my head wet,¨ I informed him. ¨Oh, ¨He looked at me like I was a deranged hobo,¨Are you ok?¨) I stopped at every drinking station, and paraded down the street dramatically as I acknowledged the crowds on the side who werecheering the runners on.

Granted, I was running slowly, but just the same I was AMAZED at the people I saw running next to me! There were moms with chunky layers of cellulite dripping out of their miniskirts, men with pot-bellies bulging out of their muscle tees, and frail looking 85 year old cancer patients.... these runners were PASSING ME UP! It was incredibly inspiring (in a self-loathing kind of way.)

The ultra marathons I´ve run in the past helped me significantly. At mile 17, when everyone was complaining that they had 9 more miles to go, I thought 9 miles that´s nothing! 9 miles is so much better than 34 more miles.

Eventually I did finnish. It ended up taking 4 hours and 10 mins. Although I had taken the run easy I still felt nauseated and weak upon finnishing. I could hardly walk back to the car. I was actually baffled by my exhaustion. When I ran my ultra marathons I felt slightly drained at mile 25, but not at all exhausted. How in the world had I gone on and ran an additional marathon then, when I could hardly even walk to the car after the running the salt lake event?
The answer to that question is in the power of the mind. In the past I had told my self that I had to make it for 50 miles. Knowing this, I didn´t break down until about mile 45. My knowledge of the task I had ahead of me altered my normal physical capacity. If I have to run a 13 miler I´d break down at mile 10. A marathon, mile 23. A 50 miler mile 45. 100 miler… Ok I´m breaking down just thinking about that. But seriously we are capable of so much, we don´t break down until we tell ourselves to. The only reason that marathons are so hard is because people believe that they are.