SFM Race Recap

A week ago right now, we were laying in bed, trying to go to sleep. The night before a marathon, we go to bed early with every intention of getting "a good nights rest"....but the reality is there is no good nights rest before a marathon. The adrenaline is already starting to kick in, mind races about all the small details, and you are already mentally running the race.
The alarm was set for 3, but we were awake at 2. My right calf cramped up. I wasn't sure what way I needed to move my foot, so I moved nothing. There was some yelling, and crying, and then just as suddenly as it came, it left. Now what? Do I get up and walk it off? Do I rub it out? Do I stay off it and let it rest for an hour? Not being sure of what was best, I did a combo. Got up and quickly realized walking was extremely painful. Got back to the bed and grabbed my Ironman Muscle Rub on the way. Rubbed it in, took some Ibuprofen, and layed back down. I think I was hoping it was all a dream, as this could not possibly be happening after 15 hard weeks of training. This was not happening on marathon morning. Its not allowed to happen.
We were up and out of bed again at 3:30ish. Still lots of pain, but we were doing this no matter what. I had no idea how the day was going to play out. I didn't really know how much I was going to be able to push my calf. It felt like it was on the verge of cramping up all day, and would be for the next few days after. How would it handle the hills? As we went through the motions of getting ready, I think we were both filled with doubts about how the day would play out.
We ate breakfast, which for me is Kashi and 2 bananas. We also both take bars to eat about half an hour before our start. Brian wears Asics shorts w/mesh pockets across the back for marathons. We loaded up his shorts with cut up Builder bars and Sports Beans. I also stuck 2 packs of Sports Beans in the tops of my arm sleeves, which worked out really well. I didn't' have to bug Brian to hand me fuel as we came into the aid stations. Dressed, food in, timing chips attached to shoes, bibs pinned on, and we were out the door.
We got into the city around 5, found a parking garage near by pretty easily. The streets were swarming with runners, which is always neat. From the time we got off the freeway, there were runners walking in the direction of the start. There were a few coffee shops opened up early that were filled with runners. We were there in time to see the first wave start. Talk about athletes! These were the elite runners, and man did they look it. What a mean, lean looking group! They were wave 1, we were wave 6. After we saw the start, we headed for the porta pottie lines, found a relatively short one and got comfy for a long wait. We heard the waves start, one by one. They started about 15 minutes apart. By the time we completed our bathroom activities, and made it to where our wave was, the wave in front of us was starting. We jumped into our corral, in the front. They brought a ribbon across the front, and slowly walked us up (maybe half a city block) to the start line. A few pictures, and a video later and we were off.
It was crowded, but as expected. This is a huge race as far as marathons go. We start with the first half marathon runners, and there were near 25,000 runners total, so asphalt was in high demand. Remembering back to our Napa marathon, the first 6 miles were at about a 8:45 pace. We started this marathon at a 10:19 pace. I knew when I checked my time at the one mile marker it was going to be a long day. The first few miles are flat, first hill came quick though. I was feeling the pain in my calf, but felt full of energy still, so we ran up the first one. If nothing else, I can at least own that we didn't' walk EVERY hill. We came down the hill and were quickly running down along the marina, Dateway, Crissy Field, Presedio, Sports Basement and heading towards the hill that I had dreaded the most. Just before we headed up, we came into our first aid station. I took some Cytomax and 2 cups water, no beans. Brian bypassed it totally opting for no fuel. Then, onto the major climb. This hill is long, and I would say has 4 parts. The first is pretty steep, then not quite as steep, then steep again. Then you turn off it and onto the bridge, but after coming back across the bridge, you're back on it, and it's steep again. The neat part of it was the gong. There were 2 guys with gongs at the top, just banging their gongs. The sound was amazing, and the rhythm definitely pulled you up the hill. We did a run/walk combo on this bad boy. We walked the initial steep part, ran the not so steep part, then walked again on the next steep part. Then, we turned right onto the Golden Gate Bridge. The SFM is the only race to run on the road bed of the bridge. All other runs use the side walk. We had the 2 lanes on the city side (northbound) One heading north, one heading south. It was very crowded. You had to really watch what was going on around you, avoid elbows, avoid getting in other peoples way, make sure you stayed in your lane, and avoid tripping at all costs!! There are metal grates on the bridge that are grooved....and extremely slippery. That had me worried the whole way over. A few were covered w/black rubber mats, which was nice...but enough people had tripped over the mats that the edges were pulled up, so that was another hazard to watch out for. The bridge takes up 4 miles of the marathon, and you have to think of it as a low arch.....meaning you are either running uphill, or downhill, but never really flat. There was a great aid station on the north side of the bridge before we turned around to head back over it towards the city. It was the first to have GU, which Brian took, and the first loud music of the race. I love loud music on a course. You can hear it coming for half a mile, it gets you re energized, into a rhythm, and well, it's just nice. So we got fuel in and headed back over the bridge. The top of the bridge was fogged in, and every now and then you would feel a very light mist, which was nice. What kept me distracted most of the way back was looking for a brother from our hall that was also running the SFM as his first Marathon. This guy trained like Rocky running an insane amount of laps at the Lafayette Reservoir. He was starting in wave 7?? so we figured he would be coming across the bridge as we were heading back. We did spot him and exchanged a high five as we passed. He looked like he was in the zone! Funny thing is that immediately after we spotted him and I focused back on my running, my legs felt dead, exhausted, tired, dead. I think I said to Brian something about man, my legs are tired, but I didn't' tell him how tired. We took a right off the bridge, and up another hill. This didn't seem as bad, mainly because as much as I had been dreading that hill, I was looking forward to the insanely long, beautiful downhill I knew was waiting at the top. Brian was enjoying the trivia that had been set up along the course. He was spouting off random sentences about the grade of the steepest hill in the world, who discovered some random thing first, what actress was born here, blah blah blah.....I didn't' even realize there was trivia for a few miles and was thinking he was trying to keep me distracted. I eventually spotted a sign and realized what he had been doing, reading out loud. We headed down the hill, with the ocean on our right. It was the neatest feeling in the world, like flying. I think I actually stuck my arms out to the side at one point. Looking back, I'm sure we came down too fast and took some life off our legs, but what an amazing feeling to be running next to the ocean and feel like you are flying?? Oh, and did those Hells Angels just pose for my video? What a strange run this is!
Soon we were in Golden Gate Park. Some of you know this is one of our favorite runs. We have a route we run in the park when it gets too hot to run in the East Bay. So, we had run most of this section before, we knew it would be mostly up hill, and even more up hill heading up to Stow Lake. In the park, I started to feel really dizzy, tired, and light headed. At times it was hard to even keep my eyes open as I was running. If you go down a few posts, you'll see one called What Pain Looks Like. This was a photo that MarathonFoto took in the park, about when the dizziness hit. Also in the park is when the hip pains kicked in. I had been limping since the start, and had been over rotating my hips. So, stabbing hip pains kicked in. There were a few tears when that happened as I couldn't picture finishing with the pains that kicked in, yet I knew stopping wasn't' an option. Not just because I wouldn't let myself, but because if I stopped, Brian would not continue w/o me. I wasn't' going to ruin his finale race of his series. He had his jacket, but had to finish the race to get his medal. He said if we are stopping now is the time. This is because we were near the first half marathon finish, which if you wanted to drop and finish there you could. No way was that going to happen. I knew if we could get out of the park, it was mostly flat and downhill. There was only one major hill after that. So, we kept going. Somehow we got up and around Stow Lake, although I really don't' remember much about it. I remember really watching my footing as the road was really choppy, but not much about the scenery. Somewhere in the park we went through an aid station w/a medical tent. I got some muscle rub and some Tylenol. I absolutely hate taking any meds, but especially during a run. I usually want to know exactly what is hurting and how it feels, and how bad it feels so that I know what it is, and how badly it's hurt. Not today. I know the what and why, and don't want to know how bad it could get.
Soon enough we were looping around and heading out of the park through a neat little tunnel.
Down Haight we went, right down the middle. So strange! My fear for this street had been the smell. Thank goodness, there was no beer, or other smokey smell....probably because there was nobody on the street. There was nobody out on the sidewalks or anything. I was expecting this street to be rowdy and loud and lots of yelling (good or bad)....or at least some music....but nothing. I may have traded some beer smell for some loud music and crowd support.
The rest of the run was through some pretty ugly, industrial areas, nothing to see really, not pretty, very blah. There were a few, like I can count on one hand few, bands. I think we saw a total of 2 during the last 3 miles, which are billed as our "music miles". One thing that did happen was that we continually were diverted off the main course and onto the alternate course due to traffic. It is the same distance, but you run one block over from everyone else. The music was probably set up on the main course, and we were just missing it?? Probably. I think we were diverted 3 times.
Throughout the 26.2 miles, as we saw the aid stations coming up every 2 miles, I would eat 5 beans, try to have those in and swallowed as we got to the station, then I drank 2 barely filled Cytomax cups(maybe 1/3 full), and 2 water cups (2cd half of 2cd cup got dumped down my back). Twice I ate a piece of the cut up builder bar. And once I ate 2 sections of bananas that someone was handing out. Other things handed out along the course were beer, mimosa's, fruit cups, oranges (I only know this from running over all the peels, not from actually seeing an orange), and some kids w/gummy candy junk. Some was from actual aid stations, and some was from random people who take the time and energy to come out and support 1000's of runners that they have no personal interest in. They are appreciated way more than they know as we don't stop to chat about how nice it is of them to come out and do that, we just run past and maybe say thank you.
Anyhow, the second half of the run went by pretty fast. There was no new pain, and that was good. I was in a lot of pain, but after running for 3 hours, I knew what it was, how bad it was, and where it was. When you are running for long periods of time, and long distances, for me, it's like i can check in and out. I can check out from reality for a few miles, almost like going numb. I couldn't tell you what I'm thinking about, if anything, but then I look up and check back in.. Yep, still hurts, yep still tired, yep still running, ok, look back down and check out. Maybe its a coping mechanism when the pain kicks in?? Not every long run is like that, other times I am super alert to every little thing that is going on. Whatever it is, it worked for getting me through the second half of this run. That and a few other things, but I'll get to that.
So, we eventually cross the 23 mile mark....hitting the wall in this run just wasn't an option. I had been drained since mile 13, and hitting the wall would mean having to draw on strength that had been getting sapped for 10 miles already, there' just wasn't much left. Mentally, I was spending a lot of time in the "checked out" category, and the mental strength to keep pushing and stay focused if it had gotten harder at that point just wasn't' there. Thankfully, I never felt the wall during this run. 23 came and went, no wall. If anything, it got easier from there out. We had turned left, could see the bridge, and the stadium, and we knew how close to the finish we were. Man, did the last few miles drag out, though. Never does a mile seem longer than when its at the end of 25.2 miles!
This was an emotional finish for me, and Brian. I flipped the video on as we started down the finish shoot, which I have never done before. We spotted Matt's wife Sabrina right at the last second as she called out to us. There was a large crowd at the finish, lots of cheering and loudness, which I love! I started crying right after the video started, and can hear myself saying "I don't want to cry" on the video. And then we crossed the line, under the big finish sign, and it was over. The poor kid who put my medal on didn't' know what to say. The lady who foil blanketed me said, "its ok, its a big deal!" Yeah, it is a big deal. It was a long day. This one took us over 30 minutes longer than any other marathon. When you are running, an extra 30 minutes is a lifetime.
As I mentioned earlier, there are a lot of things that got me through this one. Having Brian at my side the entire time being number 1. Knowing he was there, stride for stride (did you see the finish line video? We literally have the same stride), and to encourage me when I needed it was invaluable. Knowing that we had trained side by side(running w/me on his lunch break 3x's a week), and had done the work, and were capable of finishing was huge. If I had any doubts about our training, it would have been extremely difficult to even cross the start line.I could not have finished this one w/o him!
There weren't many spectators, but the ones that were out on the course were amazing. I don't know them, and they don't know me...but when they take the time and effort to read you name off your bib and call out to you by your name, tell you you can do it, you look good (I know you are lying : ) even just a good job Elizabeth, or a Go Brian....you have no idea how much you need to hear that!! It gives us that boost we need to keep going, even if its just a quick boost, we need it, and we appreciate it more than they know!
Also, I have to say that I am always inspired by anyone with gray hair who is out there! There were some pretty old folks out there that were passing Brian and I like nothing. If you saw the over 200 pictures taken on this run, you saw how many amazing older folks there were out there getting it done. They are amazing, and I hope that when I am 83 like the dear lady who stopped to take a picture with me, I am still out there staying active and caring about my health.
So there you go, the longest race recap ever.
Later this week I will update you on the leg. There are compression socks in my near future, cute, right?