Monday, June 8, 2015

Gutting It Out


I had to Run or Die with that awesome
INKnBURN singlet, and it had to be tutufied!  
Perfect day with temps, no wind, no asthma BUT just didn't go as planned. This storyline is old and tired just reading this line back to myself. But it happens. It happens to the elite and to the plain Jills like myself…

Two days before I started hacking up flem — a gift from my son who coughed all over me earlier in the week. I felt I could deal with the hacking and thought that this would be the only obstacle in the race and might effect my asthma. That would be the worst case scenario, right? But I was wrong.

Murphy's law was at my door and kicking me in the gut, stomach and chest. The morning of the race, I woke with an ache in my GI area. I ignored it thinking it might be nerves and didn't take anything out of the ordinary. Usually I would have taken MAP before a long race but the ache stayed all morning, so I refrained. I didn't want any excuses.

I started off strong and right on course. I kept looking at my pace to make sure I was in there. Keep it under 9, that is all I had to do and considering last year's 9:00 in the beginning of the race, I knew I could at least bring it down to 8:50. After a while I didn't want to look at my watch so I locked on to a guy in a blue shirt as my pacer, and I ran by feel. This was working well and my feet just kept turning. The gut pain however, persisted and I told myself that I would get use to it and could ignore it. Just get to the next mile and maybe it will be gone.

The nauseation had started in around mile 5. Maybe I could just puke and be done with it  at mile 13, I thought. It might be that day. "Girl in tutu pukes!"

Again, I ignored it. Then, a side stitch feeling pain beneath my chest. Again, ignored it. I GUed every 4-5 miles. When I reached the turn just under 1:58, I was still on course but instead of my usual feeling of, "Great! Lets take it home!" I had more of a, "Oh crap, this is getting worse" alarm in my head. By mile 14 I was cramping in my gut significantly more. It became a SHARP pain and I stopped GUing and tried to drink more. I couldn't get enough water it seemed. I didn't know if the GU was contributing to this more or possibly the Gatorade. I literally came to a halt on the side of the road a few times not even able to move because of the sharp pain. Around 3-4 times I was thinking I might faint today. I looked for the grass and my vision was blurry around the edges.

Looking back at the splits I can see that at Mile 16 I still had a fighting chance to break 4:00 but without any fuel since mile 12 and all the gut pain, I was SCREWED. I wish I could have pulled myself out of this, but my feet would not turn over fast enough by mile 20. I didn't really understand it at the time, since I was more obsessed with sharp pain than my feet and lack of fuel. A full half of a marathon without fuel is a disaster for most people. I felt disappointed and a desire to quit. Wow, never have been here before.

I have never wanted to drop so badly because of just feeling so cruddy. I don't know how I talked myself into moving forward beside not being a quitter. The rest of the race became some walking, running and haulting when the gut serged. I had these lovely thoughts of :
"Why the hell do I even care about time?"
"Why the hell am I doing this?"
"What will happen WHEN you feel just like this in the 100?"
"I hate road races!"

I kept thinking my run buddy was going to come up on me and that she would get annoyed with all my stopping and walking, and I wouldn't want her to throw her race away if she was trying to PR. So I just kept going and thought I could get the last 8, 5 or 3 miles with her. Maybe even finish together if I just kept going.

Finished in 4:36 (10:28 average pace with a maximum of 6:40)

Splits miles 1-15:
8:56 / 8:46 / 8:50 / 8:38 / 8:45 / 8:46 / 8:54 / 8:56 / 8:54 / 9:12 / 8:56 / 9:10 / 9:08 / 9:44 / 9:24 /

Mile 16 with seizing pain and no GU since mile 12:
10:13 / 10:40 / 10:50 /12:44 / 12:50 / 12:34 /14:29 /12:50 / 11:57
12:34 /

Mile 26: I walked with Karen. I just didn't care anymore.
15:43

This Girl on the Run was tutufied!
So maybe this 26.2 sucked—a lot! But I got a few things that went right enough. I pulled myself together with a shower and 10 minute nap, and came back to run another 5k with my daughter for Girls on the Run that night. That's right. If I can get it together and take another hit in the gut, anyone can finish a marathon—anyone.

She had a great time and when she wanted to walk a bit, guess what, I let her.

Although, I am sorry to share TMI here, I was dehydrated from the brown color of my urine. Which may have been another issue to this race disappointment as well.

Cute shoe cookies I made the night before Bayshore
for my buddy's wedding
Wedding Day Bliss—
the day after 30 miles 
I also made more than 80 shoe cookies for my run buddy's wedding the day before the race. She had a running themed "Save the Date" card with some family joining in on the races. A large group was there at the end to welcome her across. She deserved the best of days. And those cookies were so much fun. I think I have a new hobby!!

I took most of following week off from running but jumped back in by the weekend with double digit miles back to back—because this is how I ultra. I am still piecing together what might have occurred in my gut and I am disappointed in that timing. I felt a  sadness over it. I am even crazy enough to consider pushing it in two weeks at Charlevoix. But I will NOT. Because what ever path I take, and however that story ends, I know I am being prepared for some mass suffering come September. This is what I have prayed for and trusted in. What ever it takes to finish the 100, let it be in my path. That is the real target for 2015—38 hours of celebration.

How blessed am I, that I get to gut-out and rock-out really cool goals like Superior 100. Give me strength, knowledge, ability and focused drive.