For the marathon, I planned to run a 6.5ish mile lollipop loop that started and ended by my garage. This way I could come back and grab my hydration or fuel when needed. It worked out nicely having to not carry much and it was nice to not have to use my hydration vest. Also, I knew exactly how much I had to run although the last lap, would end at the park close to my house instead of the garage.
I aimed to start the run at 6am but ended up starting 10 minutes later due to Livetrack on my Garmin watch not automatically starting. I ended up having to manually start it. It's actually a nice option for Garmin users, so you can have others track you. I wanted Hubby to be able to track me since him and the boys were going to join me for lap 3. I also had my coach track me as well.
At 6:10am I started and it was still dark. It was a perfect morning for running the marathon. Temps were in the mid 50's, so it was cool and most importantly the air quality was safe to run in. I started out nice and easy the first mile and into the second mile picked the pace up a little bit. I started feeling warmed up into the third mile and felt good. I made it to my garage at almost 6.5 miles and dropped my empty simple hydration bottle and exchanged it for a filled one with Nuun.
The second lap, I was feeling great. It was about mid lap I ran into Juan. It was great seeing him and he ran with me and we chatted for a bit. Seeing him gave me a nice little kick.
I was also getting excited because I knew Hubby and the boys would be greeting me as I came back to the garage since they would be joining me for the third lap. I was at about 13 miles when I got to the house and I was feeling good. The second lap was definitely my fastest.
Here's my setup of picking up my hydration and fuel by our garage.
Ready to get back to running. On to my 3rd lap.
It was really nice having Hubby and the boys join me on the third lap.
They did a great job of cheering me on.
And Hubby even held my UCAN bar for me. He's passing it off to me here.
I was feeling pretty good until about mile 17 when I just couldn't keep up the pace. I started to struggle more and more. My legs were just getting heavier as I kept running.
I ran the last lap solo. Hubby and the boys hung out at the park so they could be around for the finish. That last lap was the hardest for me. Mile 20 till the end was the worst. My legs just couldn't go fast and started to hurt. Mentally I was defeated. I even walked some sections and my coach texted and said that maybe run/walk intervals would be good. I tried it and it worked some but basically I just shuffled along.
When I finally got to the park where I was going to finish and saw Hubby and the boys, it helped a little but I still couldn't go any faster. I was really struggling. This was me at mile 26. Just 0.2 to go.
It was really cool to have the boys hold the tape for me but I was even happier to just be done.
I finished in 4:14:20. It's my slowest marathon but I'm ok with it. I did my best. I knew that missing multiple runs (short and long) due to the bad air quality, would affect my performance, and it surely did. I was actually hoping for sub 4, but that went out door when my legs started to fatigue.
This was considerably hard especially without the crowds and spectators. There were also no other runners to push me on the course or follow to keep me on pace. This year's Boston Marathon is definitely one like no other. Hoping some day I'll make that right on Hereford, left on Boylston and hear the spectators cheering at the finish, but for now this will do.
Happy running!
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