#17 - Long Beach.... Again

I ran my 17^th marathon in Long Beach again, for the third time, and it was not pretty.  I signed up for Long Beach because after Vineman I was ravenous for all things “becoming a professional triathlete,”  I had no idea what I was doing, but I figured racing another marathon was a good bet to help my cause. In hindsight, this was a naive decision.  I started the race off at a quick pace with my fellow quasi-speedsters so I did not have to pinball around as much like I did on my last go around on this course, however, I had a chip on my shoulder, and was feeling  little cocky, which would come back to haunt me later in the day.  I was by no means aware of how to run a  fast marathon at this point in my athletic career, but I thought I should be better than a lot of my fellow runners because of the two ironmans I had in the can, but I was putting the cart before the horse, and not taking my time to build on what I had spent years creating, I wanted too much too soon, and this race was the slap in the face wake-up call I needed to move forward in the right direction. 

 

I experienced some stomach troubles around mile ten, which threw my pace and psyche into a tailspin, but I regained my focus and resolve once the crowd thinned out around mile twelve.  I started to feel great after dousing my head and face with water at the mile fourteen aid station when the riff raff of the half marathoners were finally out of our way, and I could  get down to business. The crowd support is always constant and excited along the streets of Long Beach in early October; I can never get enough of the Rocky anthem thundering out of a ghetto blaster every other driveway. Unfortunately, my mind started to wane and energy deplete around mile sixteen, just before we entered the Long Beach State campus, which was exasperating and annoying because I wanted to get myself together to look good in front of the coeds.  It had been a quite some time since I was in college, but for some reason I felt like I was still one of them.  Thankfully my ego took over and my cadence quickened after mile seventeen, and I started to pick off a few runners, but once I cleared mile twenty I could not feel my legs.

My time was not impressive, but I still felt like I could hold on and finish fairly strong, not a PR, but respectable.  Nope.  I carried on through each aid station pouring water over my head and into my gullet, and slurping down a gel or two, but I was simply out of reach of myself.  I was humbled, and disappointed, but kept going.  Once again I smiled at the mile twenty three marker because sooner rather than later this race would be over, but I was far, far away from where I thought I was when I started this race, and light years away from where I wanted to be. Pros do not run marathons in over four hours. 

I rounded the last corner on down toward the finish shoot, one of my all time favorites of any marathon, and a definite high light of this course. I was bummed to see the clock read 4:09 as I crossed the line, yikes. I walked swiftly through the recovery area in frustration, and despair, but as I looked around at people still running in, lots of people, I realized I had done a lot that morning, I should be proud, I just ran my seventeenth marathon for goodness sake!  So, I decided, “today I celebrate, tomorrow I plan.”