Marathon PR

Yup, I did it: I broke 4:00 in a big way yesterday, crossing the line in 3:52:37. That is more than 8 minutes faster than my previous best. Yet, idiotically, I was disappointed and almost heartbroken after finishing because I hadn’t run a Boston-qualifying time. (Don’t worry: Already, little more than 24 hours later, I’ve already knocked those feelings out of my pea-brain!)

Let me back up. I ran a stellar race yesterday. I didn’t let nerves or emotions overwhelm me. I ran a relatively consistent pace, going out slowly for the first few miles as I knew I needed to do to stay strong for the distance. My playlist was perfect, boosting me up when I needed it and keeping me steady when that was called for. The weather, rainy at first then mostly overcast, ended up being great running conditions. (Although I got a massive blister on my right big toe, a first for me. It was so big, on the drive back to Portland, LJ and I debated naming it!)

And I felt strong for the vast majority of the race. Literally, I felt wonderful, yelling out, “I feel fantastic!” to my good friends Amber and Angella who were cheering me on near mile 8.5. I was comfortably running mile after mile at a pace between 8:32-8:47. It felt easy, natural, fluid not forced—just like Lynn had assured me it would. I continued to feel stellar until about mile 15, then I shifted my pace to be consistently faster as LJ and I had discussed I should if I was feeling up for it. (“Take the chance, Sarah!” she yelled out to me at one point.). I felt challenged but still very good until about mile 22. LJ was at various spots, handing drinks and energy gels and chews to me, and she commented later how I was never running with the same pack. I was picking off runners throughout almost the entire race. I felt good from about mile 22 to 25 and decent until almost mile 26.

Then my body went into complete shut-down mode.

Even as it was happening, I marveled at it. One of my mantras is, “Empty the tank”; it’s a goal I've had countless times in races. But until yesterday, I’d never really achieved that condition. Yesterday I did. It was like the electricity had been cut, and all systems were powering down. As you can see from one of the photos above, I had a distinct feeling of crumpling—like the backside of my body was an accordion folding onto itself. I continued shuffling toward the finish line, never walking, but I nearly collapsed immediately after the finish line. Thankfully my dear friend Ellison had finished less than a minute ahead of me so she was there for me to lean on as I hobbled into the finishers’ area.

Again, let me rewind: As I was approaching the finish line, I could make out one face in the crowd--Joanne, Phoebe’s teacher from last year. Joanne, a tall, attractive brunette, was jumping up and down with tears were streaming down her face. Even through my systems-failure haze, I could distinctly hear her shouting, “Sarah, you did it! You did it!” She was in the same ecstatic state when we met up outside the finishers’ area about 20 minutes later, as I teetered out with ice bags Saran Wrapped to my quadriceps. All I could think was, “No, Joanne, I didn’t. I didn’t qualify for Boston and I feel awful.”

But within hours I realized how right Joanne was—and how I wish, even now, that I could have shared in her unbridled elation. My training with LJ had been going so well for so many weeks that she and I had come to accept that I would meet my longtime goal to break 4:00. As LJ told me after one of our runs, “You’re going to break 4 hours. It’s up to you to determine by how much.” Thus, I realize now, I’d shifted my A-goal to running a BQ time, assuming the sub-4:00 was a done deal.

So today I’m trying to capture some of Joanne’s joy, looking back at a top-secret email I sent LJ way back in November, when we were just in the planning stages for this marathon. I’d written her a span of possible finish times and how I’d feel if I ran them. Here’s a snippet:
"3:51: Unbelievably Stoked, All Cylinders Firing

3:53: Wowee-Wow-Wow"

Seeing that I landed smack-dab in the middle of those two times, I’m doing my best to feel a mixture of “unbelievably stoked” and “wowee-wow-wow.” I’m getting there.

-SBS