At mile 23 of the marathon I was running along pretty proud of myself as I was running while most others were walking. I am looking around thinking that this was the farthest that I had ever run, I was feeling great and my family was waiting for me just a couple of miles up the road. My goal was in sight and I was going to finish a marathon. Then, the worst thing happened...a guy walked by me. Yeap, I was running and an old guy walked by me. I stopped running and thought, you are a loser. You are running so slowly that a guy passed you walking. What kind of runner are you? How fast are you actually going? Who gets passed by a walker? At that moment I realized that my time was going to suck, I am a turtle and I am going to be so embarrassed to tell people my time. I saw Lennie a little up the road, he grabbed my hand and ran with me until mile 25 where he passed me off to my mom who ran with me to mile 26 and then I ran myself over the finishing .2 and finishing line. I saw my 6 plus hour time and was very disappointed. All I wanted to do was be under 6 hours and be able to at least not be one of "those" marathoners. I am not one of those people! I ran the whole freak'n way but am a really slow runner. CRAP!
So, on the drive home from Chicago I kept thinking about the race over and over again figuring out why I was so slow and where I lost so much time. I made a list and have decided that I need to make a plan in order to do better next time.
Operation minus 43 means that I plan to take 43 minutes off my Chicago Marathon time.
I know, you think that is nuts. No one can take that much time off. I will be 43 years old next year so why not go for 43 minutes off my time. Look at my plan and see how I know it is possible to return to Chicago October 9, 2011 and run a 5:45 marathon (or faster).
- don't freak out about the hot weather -5 minutes
- drop 14 pounds to weight 199 at marathon time -8 minutes
- see a podiatrist about my foot pain -5 minutes
- learn to run faster at the 10km clinic -6 minutes
- don't high-five so many people -2 minutes
- run in the middle of the road not the right side -2 minutes
- no more 10:1s -5 minutes
- only walk the water stations -5 minutes
- less sightseeing -1 minute
- take Cold FX so I don't get sick the week of the race -1 minute
- carry 2 more gels for energy -2 minutes
- run more races to practice -1 minute
Operation Minus 43 begins now!!!!
PS the slogan for this year's marathon was 10-10-10 "the date to motivate".
Next year, the race will be 9-10-11 and my slogan will be "run like hell and then some!"
