Grandma's Marathon 2016! 4th time's the charm! Part 2

4:00 a.m. - The ring of the alarm clock did its thing. It was time for Kim to get up and make her way down to the front of our hotel to board her bus. I remained in bed for another 30 minutes though I didn't fall back to sleep. At this point, sleep was just out of the question as the nerves were already starting to get going. At 4:30, it was my time to get up. My alarm went off and up I jumped out of bed ready to tackle the task of the day. The Grandma's marathon has been my favorite race as evidenced by this being my 4th time to run it and I've only run 8 marathons total. At 4:45, exactly 3 hours prior to the start of my race, I started scarfing down my breakfast which included 1 whole bagel and a banana plus a whole bottle of water.

All registered runners were listed on the car. 

For those of you that have never done the Grandma's Marathon, let me describe it a bit more in detail.  The Grandma's Marathon is a point-to-point race starting in Two Harbors, MN and then traveling Southwest along the North shore of Lake Superior. To get to the starting line, you have a couple options. You can either board a bus or take the train to the starting line. The thought of riding the train actually sounds like fun except that it is a longer ride to the start and I imagine it being a little more cramped than on the bus. That's why I decided on the bus. The course itself is nearly flat with only one decent incline around mile 22.

This particular morning was a warm one starting out at 68 degrees and clear skies. There was very little wind which was perfectly fine with me. I was a quite a bit nervous about the temperatures being too warm but I wasn't going to let it change my mind about giving it everything I had to try and break the 2:37 barrier. I was very focused this morning. In the past, I usually find other runners to talk to on the bus or while waiting around near the starting area. Not this morning. I had put together a 'get psyched' playlist on my phone to get some energizing songs stuck in my head and I spent the entire time up until I dropped off my gear bag listening to it and just remaining focused.

Kimi was running the half marathon this morning and her race started at 6:15 in the morning whereas mine started at 7:45. With this timing, I was able to track her on my phone all the way to the finish line and then ditch my gear bag and head to the start. It is always a great feeling when she runs on the same day as me and I get to see how well she does prior to starting my race. If you want to get more details about her race, check out her blog all about it by clicking Kimi's Blog.  With the results of how she ran, I had even more confidence headed into my race.

The facilities

The starting line corral 50 minutes before the start

While I was waiting to see the results of Kimi's race, I was waiting for one final pit stop at the porta-potty. The line took what seemed like forever. I've never really understood what takes people so long on this. If you need to spend 5 minutes in there, then get in line extra early before the lines start forming. Anyhow, I immediately started warming up with a jog to the bag drop and then a jog to the starting line. Then I spent the final 5 minutes jogging in place and doing some active stretching to get the muscles warmed up.

Finally, the gun sounded and off we went. All 7500+ runners started funneling out of the starting area. It took me about 6 seconds to get across the official starting line. Because of the heat, I started conservatively with my first mile at 6:07 and then kept rolling for the next 6 or so miles in the 6:00-6:05 range with the majority being really close to 6:00. As far as I can recall, I never allowed myself to get more than about 30 seconds over 6 minute pace. I had been following a pack of about 6 girls and 5 guys for several miles already when I noticed one girl was trailing just about 20 meters or so behind the pack. I slowly pulled up next to her as she was running all alone and she didn't let me go right by. She picked up the pace just enough to stay right beside me as I was surging forward a bit. I started talking to her and found out that she was a former Dallas Baptist runner so we were able to converse about some Missouri Southern cross country and track events that she had attended (MO Southern was were I went to school). I asked her what her goal was and at that time she was shooting for a sub 2:40. I told her that I intended to run sub 2:37 and it didn't seem to phase her a bit. She went right along with me. We kept clipping off mile after mile and then at mile 10, I reached down to grab my first GU and was shocked when I found that both of my pockets were empty. My GU had somehow fallen out of my pockets. Fortunately for me, my new found racing partner (Kelsey Bruce), had some fuel on the women's elite tables. She was only using about half of her gel and half of her fluids so she started handing me the remainder after she was done. I have to say, I think that she might have seriously saved my race. Kelsey and I came through the half marathon about 20 seconds over a 6 minute average. I didn't panic one bit. I told her that I was going to start picking it up around mile 16 in hopes to run a rock solid final 10 miles and still reach my goal.

We worked together all the way until mile 23. I'm so used to running with elite women since my usual running partner is one that Kelsey and I just kept feeding off each other's energy. We went through aid station after aid station with her splitting to the right to grab her fluids and me splitting to the left to grab mine and then quickly regrouping after the station. If I pulled ahead a little during the aid station, she'd pull right back up to me and when she'd happen to get through a little faster than me, I'd do the exact same thing. At mile 23, the women's elite race was really ramping up. Much earlier in the race, Kelsey and I had worked together to catch that small group of elite women and we were a lot of the reason the group started to split up some. At this point though there were only a few women competing for the top 4-8 spots and one of them passed us around 3 miles to go. I had been checking the time at each mile marker and knew that I was on pace to hit my goal so long as I didn't have any implosion in the final 3 miles. Part of me wanted to try and pick up the pace to see just how good I could finish but wisdom told me to just keep the pace strong and consistent. With my prior experiences, I knew that you could be flying one minute and the next thing you know, you're out of gas and crawling in.

I watched Kelsey pull away from me as she started chasing and competing with the other elite women just in front of us. Now it was all me. I stayed focused as I came to the brick road in downtown Duluth. There wasn't much shade so I just kept grabbing sponges and cups of water to cool myself (I had started doing this for the final 10k at every aid station) and put a look of determination on my face. I know I did this as I could hear many people in the crowd point it out. My pictures back that up too. I had finally reached the final mile and knew that if I just kept it around a 6 minute pace, I would be golden to reach my goal. It hurt like crazy but I told myself, 'why hurt and lose when you can hurt and win!', which is one of the few things I learned from my collegiate coach. As I crossed the 26 mile mark, I panicked for a moment. I saw the clock and knew I had 90 seconds to get to the finish line. In my mind, I was thinking that I had a quarter mile to go which meant I had to run under a 6 minute pace for the final quarter to get across under my goal. I didn't want to leave anything to chance so I immediately poured out everything I had left.

I made it to the final 30 meters and that's when reality set in. I was going to accomplish my goal! Emotions immediately rushed across my entire face and throughout my entire body. Sometimes, when you want something so bad, and work extremely hard to get it, you take the time to envision what it will be like to accomplish it. I had been doing that all week. I just knew that if I came across that line on pace, I'd be doing some crying tears of joy and relief. My finishing photos are a bit embarrassing for me to show to everyone but I figure why not give you all a glimpse of what it looks like to see pure emotion after 26.2 miles and miles and miles of training, discipline, and focus.

The question everyone asks me now, is "Now that you've reached that goal, what are you going to do next?"  My answer, "set a new goal and go for it stress free knowing that I've already reached my lifetime goal. Everything from here on is just having fun and putting icing on top of the cake!"

The view of Mile 25 from our hotel room window.

This marks the Grandma's Marathon finish line permanently!