Road to the Thunder Road Marathon

08/13 - I tried running 10 miles today with a friend of mine in Charlotte. It was a blazing hot day. Between that and my herniated disc, which I didn't know I had at the time, I barely made it. Walking was definitely involved. Everytime I started to run, I had to fight the urge to avoid passing out. It was excruciating...

09/09 - I tried running for the first time in just under a month, but I only made it 0.4 miles before the pain made me stop short...

09/10 - I tried running again, but I only made it 0.4 miles before the pain made me stop short...

10/04 - I found out from a doctor in Charlotte that I have a herniated disc in my neck.

11/22 - I went for a 45 minute run in the gym on a treadmill. This was the first time I'd run since 09/10. Having forgotten what it was like on a treadmill, I accidentally set the incline too high (6%) so I felt tired early and a bit out of breath, but after 30 minutes or so, everything started to settle in and I felt myself begin to open up. I actually felt pretty good. I limited my arm swing to avoid aggravating my herniated disc. My next trial would be the Turkey Trot on 11/24...

11/24 - I woke up around 7:30 am to get ready for my first real road test, the 2005 Turkey Trot in Dallas, in over three months. The race started off well, but then my shins really began to hurt about 0.5 miles into the event. I thought I might have to walk. Determined to not let that deter me, I kept pushing onward. I hit the 3 mile marker at 28:40.9 and I noticed that the pain in my shins subsided. I was starting to feel pretty good. There was some tingling in my left arm, but not too much. Again, I kept a limited arm swing to avoid aggravating the nerve. I completed mile 4 in 8:58.1 and was feeling pretty good; mile 5 came in at 8:43.0; miles 6 & 7 came in together at 17:44.8 (roughly 8:52/mile) as there were some inclines to deal with. The last mile was difficult towards the end but I ended with a strong 7:56.3 bringing me home with a total elapsed time of 1:12:03. Needless to say, out of breath, legs suffering from a long-awaited pounding, I was extremely pleased by my strong finish. Plus, it was nice bumping into some of my old running friends--Master Kim, Jill, Amy, Kristen, and Kristin.

11/28 - I went on a 3 miler on the treadmill at the gym today. It felt okay. I was still feeling sore from the Turkey Trot.

12/03 - I woke up around 6:45 am to a cold 28-degree cloudy morning in Charlotte. Why you ask? On Wednesday, 11/30, I signed up for the inaugural Charlotte Thunder Road Marathon. I used my performance at the Turkey Trot and days leading up to the deadline to decide if I was truly "ready." Loaded up with Gu, muscle relaxers, and Advil, I walked about six blocks in the cold to the start line. The pre-race setup was great--no lines for the bathrooms. When the race started, I made it two blocks before my calves started to hurt--bad sign. Anyway, I was determined to do yet another thing not recommended for beginning runners--change my race strategy. I decided to do a modified Galloway program of running for six minutes and walking for one. The first three miles I think I was passed by every single runner on the course. However, everything started warming up and starting at around mile three I started passing people. As a matter-of-fact, I continued passing people all the way up through the finish. Each mile through 14 I grew stronger and stronger. At the halfway point, which, coincidentally was near my favorite bar, Morehead St. Tavern, I had no doubt that I was going to finish. My time at the halfway point was just under 2 1/2 hours. Around mile 17 it definitely started to become more difficult, both physically and mentally. Around mile 24, near another favorite, Philospher's Stone Tavern, I temporarily stopped taking walk breaks because it was too painful to start back up running again. I did get another wind at mile 25 knowing that I just had to make it down the hill, turn right, and then turn left onto the finishing stretch.

I'm not sure how it happened, but I finished in 4:46:33. I finished 555 out of a field of 717 entrants. Clearly in the bottom half of all finishers, but I again beat my time expectation by at least 30 minutes--a tribute to my being an underachiever. I never hit "the wall". While physically totally unprepared save for spinning twice a week to keep my aerobic level up, I believe that mentally my game was on that day. I believe that running marathons is 99% mental and 1% mental.

The walk back to the Westin Charlotte was the toughest part of the marathon. It took F-O-R-E-V-E-R. And I was intent on going out later that afternoon and night...

Clearly overtraining was not an issue here. Today's marathon almost doubled my training mileage. Would I do this again? One of my goals has always been to be adequately prepared. And I would have done so had it not been for my herniated disc. I would have to rank this as one of more crazy and stupid things that I have ever done. I was clearly not physically ready for this event. I had also taken muscle relaxers the night before which left me dehydrated. Last year's training for the Dallas White Rock Marathon was pretty bad, but this eclipsed that amount of undertraining by...literally...miles. Of course, before the White Rock Marathon, I did make it to a party the night before...

Needless to say, I was in danger of breaking my streak of consecutive marathons. I had run at least one a year for the past four years. And now that streak is still alive and I have extended it to five! Until next year...