And I Know Things Now, Many Valuable Things..... That I Hadn't Known Before

I think I have recovered enough and have had enough time pass that I can objectively write about my Half-Marathon experience from Saturday.  I think.

Before I talk about the race, I should talk about the Expo.  Anyone who has run any kind of race knows about Health and Fitness Expos.  They are held in conjunction with races and generally feature swag from sponsors, external vendors hocking things that runners want and seminars that some people actually go to.  I, personally, have never been to a seminar, and that may explain part of my issues with running, but my general feeling is that I shouldn't be taking advice on sports bras the day before the race.  I'm pretty much screwed already if I haven't figured that out.

Anyway, on Friday, I headed over to ESPN's Wide World of Sports with a couple of my kids and my Mom and Aunt Suzy to pick up our packets, buy some official race merch and hit the Expo.

Don't you love this blue sky?  Eat your heart out, folks back home!

First stop was packet pick-up.  We hit the Kids' Races first, then the Half and then the Goofy (Matt's Half and Full in two days.)  We all got our bags and shirts.  The kids even got commemorative Mickey Ears.  Jack models them nicely, don't you think?

About now, we should send a special "shout out" to Grandma for her sponsorship of the Kids' Race.  She thought it would be something fun for all of her grandkids to do together.  I didn't make it over to watch the actual race, as I was laying in the bathtub contemplating a wattery death, but my Dad said that if we did nothing else the entire week, watching all those kids run and race together would have made the trip worth it.

So, the Expo.  All kinds of fun.  Strangely enough, I can say that most of the stuff for sale in this place exists in some form or another in my home already.  I had a few stops to make..... I was looking for the special edition New Balance shoes, covers for my headphones, shoe bling, a tube of Glide for Matt and of course, my Dooney and Bourke bag.

In order to get the shoes, you put your name and cell phone number into a virtual line; it was THREE HOURS long!  At the end of the wait, you were fitted by a "shoe specialist" who lets be honest, just pulled my size off the shelf, and then I was allowed to buy 4 pairs of adult sized shoes and 2 pairs of kid sized shoes.  So, put my name in and we were off to the Expo.

Walked around, made most of my purchases and still had an hour and a half left to kill.

Went to buy my special purse.... SOLD OUT!  Bummer Batman!

Went to the ESPN Grill and sat down to enjoy my pulled pork sandwich and Grape PowerAde Zero.  I think the old people bussing the tables were frustrated that we weren't leaving, but I figured that I was going to be running like a chump the next day, so there was no point in being on my feet any longer than I have to, right?  Finally we headed down to wait for our turn to head into get our shoes.  After picking up shoes for me, Allie, Aunt Suzy and Super Sarah, with a pair for Jack thrown in for good measure, we were at the checkout.  I gave them my debit card and.... DECLINED.  Fraud Alert.  Because of Target.  So I call the bank, with the clerks waiting.  I explain to them that yes, I am in fact, in Florida, and that I will be there until the 19th.  Please remove the warning from my account.  "Okay, Mrs. Pierce, everything should be fine now."  Tried to run it again.  DECLINED AGAIN!  Everyone was tired and sick of crowds and nothing was working.  Thank goodness Aunt Suzy was there and saved the day with her debit card.  Don't you love our new shoes?

Bek's Minnie Mouse Shoes.  Lovin' the polka dots and the bows!

Jack really did need new shoes.  An 8-year-old boy is hard on trainers.

Allie and Erin got some cute Cinderella shoes... that girl has the right idea about a good pair of shoes!

Back to the hotel to prepare for the next days race.  Matt had arrived with Erin and Will and we went to my FAVORITE place to eat in Walt Disney World.... The Earl of Sandwich.... for dinner.  As we prepared to head to bed, we got all of our stuff together.  I think an expedition to Everest would require less planning.  We had to get our clothes, shoes, socks, supportive unmentionables and bibs together.  We plotted and planned about the best places to rub glide and place Band-Aids in order to avoid the dreaded chaffing, and we made sure that our electronic devices and headphones were operating at optimum levels. Oh, and don't forget the awesome Rosie the Riveter tattoo.

Check, check and check.  We had to be up at 2:30 in the morning so that we could catch the bus at 3:00, be at the race by 4:00 and to our corrals (MOOOOO) by 5:15 or so.  My goodness, what a morning.

We met Super Sarah in the lobby and headed to "break our fast" with bagels, oatmeal, peanut butter, bananas, etc.  I was really worried to eat too much for fear of being nauseous or pooping myself, but I think I did a reasonable job managing the situation.  We waited in line with a bunch of other nutty runners and left for the staging area at 3:30.  Off the bus and headed to bag check, port-o-potties and crazy people who actually enjoy being up that early.  I had Sarah take our picture so that we had a before picture of our cute costumes before they were destroyed by the experience that was to follow. 

Then, I snapped a pic with Sarah.  She's pregnant.... so you can read her number really good.  I'm not, and you can read mine equally well.  Bummer!

"Runners, it's time to head to your corrals."  Off we went.... headed to H, which it turns out, stands for HELL.  Matt was in L, but of course, he would catch up quickly.  Our corral placement was determined by previous races... mine was a 10K (double the distance, double the time, right?) and Matt's was because of his "slowest marathon finish" that I entered in error.  Oh well, it all worked out.  Whatever!

Here are Sarah and I smiling (that's how you know it's before the race).  The fireworks signaling the start of the race are just about to go off and we are getting ready to go.  The commentary at this race is boring... it's like listening to commentators talk about curling.  There's only so many times you can listen to them count down from 10-1 and then you move forward 20 feet.

Super fun!  Finally, it was our turn to run.  As I mentioned before, we had a walk/run strategy that we hoped would give Sarah the rest she needed and me, the time that I needed.  I was hoping that we would be able to keep about a 14 minute pace.  What I didn't count on, was that even in her "motherly way" Sarah's legs are still longer than mine and she can power walk like nobody's business.  I think she figured out pretty soon after she started that she had an albatross around her neck named Rebekah.  Within the first 2.5 miles, my IT bands in both legs started to seize up at the top and it hurt.  I could run at when it was time to run, and it felt better, but I could tell the walking was not going well.  Not a good thing when my strategy was to walk more than run.

The good news was that I was running at sea level and I had "trained" at 4200 feet.  That sounds to me about as helpful as describing the heat in Utah as more manageable because it's a dry heat.  Whatever.  I was running with no problem breathing, pains in my chest or anywhere else, and felt relatively good.  After a bit, we had settled into a walking routine and Sarah said she had to stick with walking until we found a toilet..... Baby Charlotte was jumping around on her bladder.

Between the pit stop, and a break for me to stretch my aforementioned IT bands, Matt passed us.  He was in L, how did that happen so fast?  Boggles the mind, I know.  He texted me and asked if we were in the Magic Kingdom yet?  Nope.... we were still hanging out around the Ticket and Transportation Center (aka the Parking Lot.)  He said he would be waiting for us at the entrance to Tommorrowland.  So, on we went.  One of the things that I loved about the race was seeing some of the behind the scenes stuff that makes Disney so awesome.  Their employees were no exception.  It was so cool to run through these "off-limit" areas and see folks taking time off from their work days to cheer us on.  Truth be told, they made a big difference for me; during and after the race.  It was great to head down Main Street USA and to see the Castle.

Sorry that the picture is so bad.... it's the best I could do with my phone.

These two pictures signify where the Bek Baton was passed; meaning Sarah was now free to run her race her way, and Matt, my long-suffering spouse was there to suffer with me.  This was pretty much the last time we saw Sarah, except for the finish line.  Great job I did, taking care of her.  Thanks Sarah for being such a great example and for doing your best.

I managed to jog through Tommorrowland, into Fantasyland and through the Castle... which is great, but I refuse to pay $24.95 for the photographic evidence so you're just going to have to take my word for it.  We slowed down a bit through Frontierland, but are very familiar with running through that area in general, headed for Fast Pass Return at Splash Mountain. Anyway, past the train and out of the Magic Kingdom.  This was about 6 miles in, and I was hurting.  I had never run this far before and the crowds were driving me crazy.  That's one thing that Disney races are famous for; bottlenecks for runners.  There are areas where it opens up a bit, but for the majority of the time, it was me and 20,244 of my closest friends.  I had more than one person run between Matt and me (when we were close enough to hold hands) and in swinging my arms while walking, I grabbed more than one sweaty man crotch that didn't belong to my husband.  Yuck!

We came around the loop and past the Grand Floridian resort.  I stopped to stretch and was humbled.  I was low.  This was hard and I still had 7 miles to go!  How was I going to do this?  I can't say that I had any great strategy.  I made sure to drink at all the stops and tried to be positive.  I thanked the volunteers and cursed those running around me.  By the end of the race, I'm sure that anyone who had spent any amount of time around me must have thought that I had Tourette Syndrome.  I tend to swear a blue streak when I'm frustrated.  The road between Magic Kingdom and Epcot has never seemed so long as it did on Saturday; and that includes the time I stood on the bus holding a sleeping toddler, balancing a stroller and trying to stay upright.  We had to go over the road twice on overpasses and walked around the longest stinking cloverleaf ever created by traffic engineers.

I hobbled toward the back entrance to Epcot with the promise from Matt that all we had to accomplish at this point was to walk around "the ball" (aka Spaceship Earth) and out the other side, into the parking lot, and across the finish line.  Well, we had to walk "all the way down" to the International Gateway and then back and then out the gate, past the gospel choir (featuring a white boy) and then, finally, the Finish Line was in sight.  Matt made me practice our "big finish" (arms raised) all the way through Epcot and we jogged (very slowly) across the mats at the end.  Oh my heavens, I have never been so happy to see something end; not even labor and childbirth.

But, I made it.  I finished.  I didn't get kicked off the course and I got my medal.  About Mile 11, I was starting to fantasize about how I would assault someone who tried to thwart my dream at that point.  Fortunately for the old ladies with the balloons, we didn't have to find out how that one ended.  As soon as we had our medals, we headed toward the self-treatment area to ice ourselves.  Now, self-treatment only means that you walked in by yourself, because they have lots of helpful folks waiting there to hand you bags of ice and attache them with plastic to your body if necessary.  Some nice young man brought me ice and offered to wrap them to my thighs... yeah, not happening, but thanks anyway.

Oh I loved sitting on that hard metal bleacher.  I did not want to get up, but Sarah was waiting for us and I heard a rumor that there were bananas and PowerAde just past the ice area.  I took my shoes off, which may have been a mistake.  My feet hurt, but this was a surprise.

I know you were all dying to look at my beautiful toes.  I wanted a pedicure before the race, but I'm not sure that it would have mattered.  Anyway, my feet hurt, but this was my only blister.  I hobbled on, got my bananas and drink and met up with Sarah.  We got our stuff we checked and hit the buses.  I have never been so relieved to get on a bus in my life.  It was wonderful; except for climbing up and down the stairs.  That really hurt.  But I survived.

This is a really long story.  You may have stopped reading miles ago.  I wanted to document this so that I can remind myself next time I feel the urge to run that it was not a pleasant experience.  This is probably the wrong attitude, but I am a realist.  I did not LOVE any part of that run.  I can say honestly that it's a good thing that I love Disney, because otherwise, it would have been AWFUL.  I could barely walk the rest of the day and honestly contemplating wetting the bed rather than trying to get up and make it into the bathroom.

My results were lackluster.  I didn't get kicked off the course, true, but out of all those finishers, there were only 40 that finished after me.  I wasn't last, but somehow, that doesn't make me feel a whole lot better.  I wasn't even last in my age group.  There were four other women who came in behind me. Four; that's not too many.  There was a guy wearing a shirt that said "Dead Last is better than Did Not Finish and Did Not Finish is better than Did Not Start."  I think I will come to agree with this, in time.

So, what got me through?  From Mile 3 on, I was asking myself how was I going to do this?  All that kept coming to me was that, two years ago, at nearly 300 pounds, there would have been NO WAY that this would have even been conceivable.  It just wouldn't have happened.  I have come a long way. I kept thinking of my kids and what a good lesson this would be to them.  I'm always telling them not to quit when things get hard.  It was time to put my money where my mouth was.  For my Allie, who hates anything physical (like me at her age) and for my Erin, who strangely enough, thought that I could do it.  For Jack, who was sad when I told him that I was going to lose weight because I wouldn't be comfy anymore.  And for Will, who is my only child that has not developed a love of Diet Coke because I don't drink it anymore.  He's a PowerAde fiend, but he doesn't love carbonation.  Matt, who stuck with me through everything.  Who honestly (God only knows why) believed I could do it.  Who traded his great race to hang out with me.  I know it was hard for him to look at a 4:00 half-marathon, but I honestly would have given up without him.  He made me laugh to take my mind off things.  He talked to me about costumes, funny things, funny people and strategies for finishing.  When we finished, he helped me hobble around, and he was insistent that the rest of the day be about my accomplishment.  He even made me wear my medal for the rest of the day.  My dad said I was walking like a double amputee; I think that might have been easier.  Matt rubbed my legs down multiple times, poured me a bath, applied Deep Blue and picked up the majority of the kid duties for the rest of the day so that I could try and recover.  He made me walk and took me and the kids to ride a few rides.  He didn't mind that I was slow and was just wonderful, overall.  All this, despite the fact that he had a repeat wake-up call on Sunday morning at 2:30 to run his Full Marathon.

I have a new respect for my husband.  I have always said that he has learned to love running because it's cheaper than therapy.  It makes a real difference for him.  And he is very cognizant of the sacrifices we make on the weekends so that he can train; four hours is a long time to be gone when you spend your week out of town.  Halfway through the race, I told him that I was sorry that I ever asked him to do ANYTHING on the days that he did a long run.  It is hard.  I have not ever experienced that much physical pain.

I have a new respect for so many of my friends that run.  Count me impressed.  I can certainly understand the draw of wanting to be out in the sun, but training runs on treadmills take dedication.  I admire you, but no longer want to be one of you.  Katie, if you're reading this, you need to find a replacement for me on the Ragnar team..... that won't be happening.  I will find peace and contentment as a walker.  For now, around Centerville.  In the future, I may be headed to a mall near you at 4:30 a.m.

Thank you for all your love and support, running world.  For your words of encouragement and advice and well wishes.  I will remember this race fondly (a long, long time from now) and be glad that I did it.  It was nice.  

Don't know if you got the Stephen Sondheim "Into the Woods" reference in the title, but it's one of my favorite songs from the musical.  Sung by Little Red Riding Hood, talking about her foray into darkness with the Big Bad Wolf.  For some reason, these lyrics just seemed fitting.

Into The Woods; Nice is Different than Good.

Hopefully, this link pulls up the song.  Oh, and sorry about the ad.  There is so much symbolism.... Mother said not to do it, running was the Big Bad Wolf, dark slimy path......  I was truly excited and scared.  But, in the future, I'll take extra care, because as Red Riding Hood says, "and though scary is exciting, nice is different than good."

For all of you runners or wannabe runners who think it is good, I applaud you.  I found it to be a bit deceptive, seductive and although I am not necessarily going back to the path I was on before I tried this race, I am going to blaze my own trail and discover who and what I am meant to be.