We woke up at 4 AM to start the carb loading process. By 5:30 we were out of the house and on our way downtown to the bus pick-up zone. IT WAS CRAZY! There were so many people, the line was literally wrapped around Nordstrom (a city block). They had buses galore! We finally hopped on a bus at 6:30 (the cut-off time for buses was suppose to be 6 and there were still people behind us in line). It was the inaugural Rock n Roll marathon in Seattle so I am sure they learned a lot from this year's event (like hire/rent more buses)! It was a sold out event of 25,000 runners!
We actually arrived at the starting line on time only because our AWESOME bus driver drives like me and passed all the backed up traffic only to cut some other bus driver off right before the exit. We seriously passed 20 other buses that were probably loaded 30 minutes before ours and it was GREAT! As our driver made his maneuver in front of another driver to get us to the start line on time the whole bus clapped for him!
After arriving we had to check our bag so that we could pick-up our things at the finish line and then we proceeded to eat some more carbs before starting!
The official gun went off at 7:02 AM, but there were something like 32 waves of people that they let go in about 2 min intervals. We were in wave 25 so we didn't officially start our journey until 7:45 AM
It was a lot of fun at the beginning...everyone was excited to be there. We were in the shade for the first 9 miles of the race which was awesome and there were a lot of people on the side of the road cheering us on, but coming on mile marker 10 we crossed the Washington bridge and out came the sun and no by-standers to cheer (a very depressing point of the marathon). Then we ran through downtown for maybe a mile around the 14 mile marker and again there were lots of people (motivating)! Then we hopped on Highway 99 heading North and ran for another 4 miles, then looped around and headed South on 99 (this was the worst part of the run because 1. it was the HOTTEST part of the run 2. we were in the SUN 3. there was NO crowd because we were on bridges 4. this included miles 15-25 with at least 3 hills)
Our goal when we first started training was to finish, then it became to finish in 5 hours, and my personal goal was to not walk. I did not walk at all during my training and I felt this would be a very easy accomplishment. So in trying to accomplish my goal of not walking I left Davis behind somewhere around mile marker 15. In training we hardly ever ran together because I was faster than him, but we had decided to run the marathon together or at least finish together. So at mile 23 I started walking to allow Davis to catch up so that we could finish together and cross the line together. I decided that it wouldn't have been worth the training if we didn't get to feel that accomplishment together and weren't able to see each other finish! and it was definitely worth the wait! We had an awesome finish all by ourselves. They called out our names and although no one else there knew who we were......we knew that we had made it! We had successfully completed one of MY goals in life!
Yes, my husband only ran the marathon with me because he didn't want his wife to out do him!
After we crossed the line, we were handed bottled water, medals, bananas, oranges, bagels, ice for our joints, and a photographer was there to take our picture TOGETHER!
All in all it was a great day that we will never forget and we will always be able to say "We ran a marathon once"!
A funny story for the day.....I have decided that running that long in the sun can make a person delirious. After the run they handed you these garbage bag like things that you wrap around you to help maintain your body temperature. Well I put mine around me and tied it around me neck and then you walk like 20 feet and there is a photographer wanting to take your picture. I didn't want this bag wrap around me in the picture (then you couldn't have seen my awesome medal) so I told the photographer to hold a minute and he said "you have a cape?" and I responded with "yeah, I am a magician", "now you see (and as I tore it off), now you don't!"
Needless to say, Davis and the photographer thought this was pretty funny! Davis brought it up later and I had almost forgotten that it even happened (it was almost like being intoxicated, although I would have no idea what that is like)!
the route
at 5:00
the line in front of us for the buses
the line behind us
our awesome driver
the crowd at the start
lots of banana peels
post raceSome race stats:
There should be a finish line video soon and I will post a link to it because our finish was AWESOME!
- There were 5,602 marathon finishers
- Davis was 4,307 overall
- He was 2,182 in men out of 2,543
- He was 339 in his division out of 377
- I was 4,308 overall (that's right somehow he was ranked above me even though our times were the exact time....I wonder if they broke out the camera and watched that slow-mo)
- I was 2,126 out of 3,059 women
- I placed 178 in my division out of 237
- Our overall time was 5:23:18
There should be a finish line video soon and I will post a link to it because our finish was AWESOME!
3 comments:
Yep, both of you can now say you have do something a very small percentage of the world has ever done. Congrats and I think it is awesome that your still living (remember the first marathon running passed away after completing the run. Once again great going guys.
Dad
I'm very proud of you both...thats really an accomplishment! Love you both!
Wow, Cindy! That is such an accomplishment. I am truly amazed that anyone can run that for that amount of time or distance. And you guys look great after the race! My brother ran a marathon last year and he looked like death at the finish! Congratulations!
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