Ugh...Epic fail.
All was right with the world, until I woke up. I just slept longer than I should've. Didn't have time to really get things "moving" plus it was 3AM. Who wakes up that early?!? Anyway, left later than planned and realized that I'd forgotten my AD at home. No worries, I'd have time at the top to get business done. I didn't have time to turn around or stop. We'd be pushing getting on the last bus at 4:15 at the rate I was going!! Chad and I ended up running to the buses, in a nice stiff headwind that worried me, and got on the bus parked at the end of the line of buses. I got on the last bus. At least I got on one :) I thought Lowell would be proud of me. Until he said there was only one bus waiting when he got there 10 minutes later! My first failure of the day :)
At the top everything was going well, got to chat with people, found Jonathan (who I was pacing with and I was excited to show him my stuff and what a good pacer I was!) and we all got chatting and settled. I had gotten things moving, but was worried about my gut still so I asked if anyone had AD...nope. Shoot. Oh well, I've never had a problem before so just bank on that!
Got started and got to say good luck to Rachelle and Josie at the front then made my way back to my rightful place in the crowd. Soon, we were off. Things were great and besides the spray paint on the road (rather mean and vulgar to the runners), everything was perfect! Then, mile 5 came. I knew I'd need to use the bathroom. So, I raced ahead so I wouldn't have to push to catch up. I passed Paul pacing 3:35 and freaked them all out :) it was fun. Then I got out of the pop just as Jonathan was passing. Perfect. I hoped that was the end of it, but it turned out to be just the beginning.
The rollers shortly after gave me a little trouble, but that is to be expected on my no-good-hills legs. Mile 9 I took my gu to put back the energy and enjoy the donwhill for a bit. By mile 10 my gut had come back to haunt me. I knew this was going to be a struggle, but I'd never failed at pacing before. I was going to do this!!! Mental game - ON!
We crossed the half way just under 1:49 which was perfect for our pacing. Our purple shirt runners were ahead and for a moment Jonathan and I were alone. I told him my gut wasn't happy. It was going to be a barf or a pants issue, but it was not happy. I told him I would hang on and definitely do my best. Mile 15 I had to stop again. Ugh! I was NOT happy, but knew this was over. We still had a minute in the bank and I still had hope this would take care of it and I could get back on pace, but I knew chances were slim.
It ended up that from there until mile 21ish I couldn't run more than 1/4-1/2 mile without having my gut just cramp up on me and forcing me to walk. I was miserable. Absolutely miserable. Add to that the humiliation of people asking me what pace I was doing! Ugh! Why does this course beat me so much?!? I started thinking about what had gone wrong and what I'd done wrong. I couldn't figure it out. Then I remembered Tuesday's run. It started about the same time and felt the same way, but I was done at 10 and didn't have another 16+ to go! In the end I figured it was just something going wrong in my gut. I needed to figure this out. Maybe I was sick or it was something else, but I knew my body wasn't happy.
Andrea Bird ran with me a bit, Maynard passed me and we had much the same conversation he'd had, but with Toby, at Ogden. The 3:55 pacers blew past me and the 4:00 pacers passed while I was in the pop at mile 20...again. After that I ran into Corey and Dave and a couple others that I would continue to leap-frog until the end. Around mile 22 I finally felt like I could start giving back to the people around me. I was off pace, but still had my pacer shirt on and needed to represent. I gave out all my electrolytes and Ibuprofen. Trying to pass on kindness that had been shown to me throughout the years. I gave out cheers and encouragement and tried to get people to pick up and run with me when I could. I caught up to one of the purple girls who had been taken out by her ITB and we discussed that for a while. Then, surprise of all surprises...mile 23...Lowell came up behind me! You know you're having a bad day when your 72 year old "running dad" catches up to you!! I'd promised I'd come back and run him in with Smooth so as I whined about not wanting to run, he shouted "a promise is a promise!" He was right. I needed to give back again. It was my time to pace him in. I had some great experiences and chats those last few miles with fellow runners, Lowell, the race director and Smooth. Chad even came back to make sure I wasn't dead :) We finished together and despite my failure of pacing I was just happy to finish.
I'm really confliced about this one. I wanted that 3:40 so badly and I don't think it is beyond my capability, but I feel like an utter failure and that running just isn't my thing. I'm so emotionally drained over this one. It really hurts to think about it and put it all out there. I don't fail. I always make sure my pacing is within my capacity. Did I get too big of a head? Was it just a bad day? Do I need to re-evaluate myself? Ugh. This has really set me and my motivation back quite a bit emotionally. I'm feeling more than a little lost in the running world now :/
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