Last Sunday my running buddy, Heidi and I completed the Tucson Marathon. It was my first marathon and for Heidi it was her 5th.
First, I just want to say that it's an incredible feeling to have finished my first marathon and it was so nice to have Heidi there with me all the way. We finished together in 4:31 and a few seconds. I'm totally happy with that.
The day started out with a traffic jam of runners trying to get to the buses that took us to the starting line. Heidi and I had to bail out of the car (Matt was driving us to the buses) and walk to the buses for fear we weren't going to make it on time (they said the LAST buses would leave at 6 a.m. and it was 5:50 with traffic not moving). Luckily, we didn't have to walk too far and the buses were waiting because lots of participants were stuck in the jam. Then our bus driver wanted to drop us off at the half marathon starting point. Everyone on the bus was doing the full marathon and so the bus driver figured it out after people started freaking out. We made it to the start in Oracle 40 minutes before. We had enough time to stand in the porta john line and stretch out. We started on time at 7:30 a.m. It wasn't that cold so I took off all my throw-a-way layers right from the start. The weather was really nice for the marathon. A little overcast so we didn't have to worry about heat later in the day but warm enough that we weren't freezing at the start.
Then we ran down, down, down then up, up, up... down, up, down, up for awhile. Finally it flattened out between mile 6-11 until we did the Biosphere loop. That was mostly up with a little down. We were relieved to get done with that and I think that our best running was between mile 13 and 18.
Matt was a trooper and was at mile 18 (they didn't let spectators go to the start and there were no spectator spots until mile 18) with a nice sugary Coke for me. He also saw us at mile 20 and 22. I think we still looked ok then but our bodies were screaming bloody murder!
I took a peek at our times at certain checkpoints and we were running a 10 minute and under pace for the first 18 miles. In fact at the 15 mile we were running a 9:39 pace. However, that last 6 miles is everything it's rumored to be... We really started to slow down as our bodies were starting to really hurt and break down. We started stopping at every water break (They were our savor towards the end). Still with all that, there were lot's of positives. We passed people carrying batons (so we were passing the relay teams) and we really ran the whole marathon comfortably until the last 6 miles.
We learned that the Tucson marathon had as much uphill as it did downhill. My personal opinion (probably Heidi's as well) is that one cannot call the Tucson marathon a "downhill" marathon anymore.
Would I do it again? Absolutely! Now I know what to expect and how to prepare. Maybe there will be another marathon for me sometime in 2009.
Now my focus will be to recover and focus on the PF Chang's half marathon. My goal is to work on building some speed and getting the half done under 2 hours. During the marathon, I took note of our time at the 13 mile mark and Heidi and I were at 2:08. We were running conservatively so I think my half marathon goal is pretty reasonable.
Here's a few photos taken by Matt in between mile 18 and 22 and one at the finish.
While Heidi and I were getting started, Matt took a nice photo from our hotel room balcony. As you can see it was a nice overcast day and the perfect temperature for running a marathon.
Geesh... we look pretty happy here. I think we saw the water station! Matt took these photos so we had already run at least 18 miles.
The last part of the marathon we ran in a lane blocked off on the highway. It was kind of nice seeing all the people waving and honking in their cars. Towards the end of the marathon, any encouragement is greatly appreciated.
Just after we went through the finish line together. Huge smiles of relief. Please forgive my disheveled look and forgetting to take my goofy sunglasses off... after all, I did just run a MARATHON!
