Day 3: Marathon Day! Goal: Finish the Marathon Without Getting Swept Away by the Sad Bus

Hey yall!

Let’s start off with a background story of why I ‘wanted’ to do a marathon…
So, before I did a half marathon (Nov 2012) I wanted to do a full marathon just to prove to myself I could and really just so I could say that I did it. But, when I actually trained for and fully ran a half marathon, I really had no desire to ever do a full. It would kill my knees! Anyway, fast forward a few months, when my sister (who is less active than me. not in a negative way, but this is important to the story) says she wants to do a full marathon. She had not done a half so I like to say that she, hmm, wasn’t in tune with reality. Anyway, she says she wants to do a marathon and throws out the idea of doing the Disney one. I am still in a hate/hate relationship with running (after training for three straight months and doing the half, I was SO TIRED of running) so I am trying to make her see the light. She is stubborn, just like me, so she said she was going to do it with or without me. Well, if you don’t know this about me, I am a VERY competitive person when it comes to sports and working out and stuff like that. (along with other things too) So, the competitive nature of mine is what drove me to sign up for the marathon. I can’t sit here while Roo does a marathon, can I?!?!? Nope. So, I signed up.

RACE DAY!

Sunday January 12, 2014 was the Walt Disney World Marathon. 26.2 miles. TWENTY SIX POINT TWO MILES. It sounds so ridiculous. The race started at 5:30am so naturally we woke up at… 2:45am?! There was a shuttle bus at our hotel that took people to the race that ran from 3-4.

Shuttle Bus

I couldn’t fall asleep the night before because I was so anxious. I wanted to cry because I was dreading it! To be honest, I still wasn’t sure I would be able to finish. I didn’t train, (I worked out on a semi regular basis, so it wasn’t like I did not move before. Although I was sick for a month this past fall and I didn’t workout) so my goal was to finish the marathon without getting swept up by the Sad Bus. The Sad Bus, as my sister and I call it, was a bus that would sweep up people who were going too slow. The slowest you could go was a 16min mile pace. It sounds TOTALLY doable right?! Almost easy! BUT 26.2 miles is A LOT of miles to be moving.

It’s obnoxious to post this, but I sent this picture to James the night before because I was so anxious about the race. I needed someone to talk to so that I could calm down! Also… #demeyebrows

I think I slept maybe 30minutes, but it was time. Time to do a marathon. Again, I still wasn’t sure I could do it. To be completely honest, I wasn’t sure I could do the marathon until after I finished, but I’ll get to that later. So it was 3:30am and we were on the shuttle, ready to take off. I was still anxious, but not as much. It was time. Whatever happened would happen and it was too late to turn back! (I am definitely NOT a quitter- all those years of soccer and physically pushing myself beyond what I thought I could do really helped my mental game) Also, my sister and I both bought shirts that were inspirational. They said “every mile is magic” so that helped calm me as well.

Every Mile Is Magic

All of the runners were assigned a corral (A-Q, I think?). Group A started first at exactly 5:30am and every few minutes they would let the next group start. We were in Group O so we didn’t start the race until 6:30. I remember being hungry before we started. I ate breakfast– at 3:00! Anyway, my sister and I had our plan: we were going to alternate between running 30 seconds and walking 30 seconds, as Jeff Galloway recommended. While waiting for the start, we made a friend named Rachel. It was her first marathon as well and she asked if she could run with us so we said of course! She was really nice.

The race started and we were off! It was a little discouraging to run 30 seconds then walk 30 seconds in the beginning because everyone is passing you and you have so much energy, you just want to run run run! BUT, I am glad we didn’t start off only running. It helped in the long run. Throughout the race, we split up with Rachel because of bathroom breaks and different paces. (She was way faster than us!). Ok, let’s get down to the race. It was so fun (in the beginning) running by everything in Disney and seeing a bunch of attractions. The race started in Magic Kingdom, then Animal Kingdom, then Hollywood Studios and finished in Epcot. A lot of the good sights were in Magic Kingdom which was good because that is when we had the most energy.

Throughout the whole race, I had to keep motivating myself. The distance was wayyyy more than I had ever done before. I ran (fully ran! … because i actually trained. I never wanted and don’t have the desire to RUN a full marathon.) a half marathon in November 2012, but WOW 26.2 miles is DOUBLE that. (of course it is… it was a half marathon haha) I think I mentioned this before, but I am a very mentally tough, but I still had to talk myself through it, mile per mile. We were doing well for the first half on the race: consistently doing the 30/30, staying above pace. Around mile 14 or 15 was when problems started, for both of us. I thought my knees were going to be the thing that hurt the most, but actually it was a pain in my foot that I had never felt. It was on the opposite side of my arch, so, the outside of my left foot. It hurt to put any weight on it, so walking was better for me. Roo’s knee and ankle were hurting her pretty badly, so we decided to walk it out and take more breaks. Both of our backs were really hurting as well. We ended up walking a lot of miles after that. The next part of the race was the worst for me…

It was around the 17 mile marker (yep, this is starting to sound comical) when I started really wondering if I was going to be able to finish. I am really embarrassed and almost ashamed to admit that I honestly thought to myself, “hey, if you get to mile 20, I will still be proud.” Like… WHAT! I am not a quitter, but this distance was really getting to me. Anyway, this was the point in the race where we were running on the right side of the street and we could see people who were ahead of us on the left side. We thought the turn around point was going to be the stop sign that was a mile ahead, but no, there was a loop around the ESPN complex. That damn loop was the worst part! It’s kind of funny because I love sports and really enjoyed the Expo and atmosphere at the ESPN complex. This day, however, the atmosphere was totally different: It was miserable. For both of us! Again, every step was a struggle and I had to keep telling myself I could do it. What really helped me a lot though, was my sister. She was being incredibly positive. I had to motivate myself (she did too! and helped me!), but I was NOT positive at that point and had not been since my foot started hurting. I ended up crying towards the end of the ESPN part because everything kind of hit me at once: I was in really bad pain, we could get swept up, there was still a couple more HOURS of moving, and the main thing, this whole marathon experience was really hard.

Anyway, SOMEHOW we made it through ESPN (it probably isn’t actually called that, but hey oh well) and got back to the left side of the road. (nobody was on the right because we were going at a slow pace already. We are around mile 20 (i think??) and even though I am mad and in pain and thirsty and exhausted, I see two of the most inspirational things of the race:
1. A sign (I WISH I GOT A PICTURE OF IT, but NO, I was not worried about taking pictures at that time) that said: “You can go the distance. -Hercules”
2. A lady who had written a sign that said: “The last 100 people impress me more than the first 100”

Another sidenote: I love the movie Hercules and I LOVE GO THE DISTANCE!! (and ‘won’t say I’m in love, DUH). Anyway, seeing those two gave me more motivation. I was still damn tired and still hoping I would finish and not get collected by the Sad Bus, but this really helped. I was also very touched by all of the encouraging words and people who came out to support the runners. It was really beautiful. Also, I will say it again, my sister was a HUGE factor in me finishing the race. I want to say that I know I could have done it without her, but surprisingly she helped me so much. I owe her a lot because she was so motivational to me without even knowing it!

Ok, back to the race. Almost done! 6 miles? You have already done 20, so 6 isn’t that bad!!! Right? WRONG! (at least to me). It was still painful, but yes, I guess mentally it should be nice to think about. Wrong again! It takes us so long to complete one mile (15-16mins) so that is still well over an hour of moving (walking left!).

Ok so more motivation. More pain. But wait, what are those behind us? BALLOONS. Balloon are nice you think. NOT THESE. These balloons were evil. They were the cutoff sign: If the balloons pass you, then the Sad Bus would come and sweep you away. (I say this in a joking way, but I was really scared towards the end). More walking. More being tired. Around mile 22 the balloons were still within sight behind us. I started getting mad. Actually one lady voiced what I was thinking, “really? Yall are going to sweep us when we have made it 22 damn miles?!” I gave her a smile and said that I agreed.

By this point, I was so tired that I started to become irrationally angry. Yeah, we HAVE made it this far and THEY want to take that away from us? (the rules clearly stated the time frame that people had to follow if they didn’t want to get swept; it was not a surprise) Come on, if we have gone twenty two damn miles and we aren’t gonna be able to finish?! This new anger in me turned into motivation. I tried forgetting about my foot and I sped up. I did not want those balloons near me. Now was my time to motivate my sister. She had helped me so much during the race, but she was getting really tired and was in pain too. I helped her along and motivated another mile, but she saw that I wanted to go faster so she told me to go ahead and speed up. Before, we had planned on staying together the whole time, which we basically stuck to that plan, but at that point, running was somehow less painful than walking, so after she assured me it was ok, I took off.

This “run” was obviously very slow, but hey, I still call it running. I am proud to say that I ran the last 2-3 miles and even sprinted at the end. Well, I sprinted as fast as I could at that point. It doesn’t matter how slow I went, I accomplished my goal: I completed 26.2 miles without getting swept up by the Sad Bus. Roo finished a few minutes after me so we both accomplished our goal! This is another embarrassing part, but I cried when I finished, too. I think this time it was more happy (or at least not angry/frustrated cry) tears. I waited right past the finish line for Roo, but they said I had to keep moving forward, I went to the ice tent and waited for Roo there.

I did it!!!! First picture I took after the race. And yes, I had just got done tearing up.

Roo finished and we both were happy yet in serious pain. We went to get iced, but WOW what an amazing feeling! It was so great to do the marathon together! But really… after we finished, we both felt pretty miserable and we could barely walk.

Sissypals! WE DID IT, ROO!!!

We (at least I) didn’t feel happy and on the endorphin high until we got back to the hotel room. I forced myself to take a cold shower then I fell asleep. All I wanted to eat was pizza and being the amazing parents they are, got us pizza. It was glorious.

Pizza sidenote: I always get nervous when I think about what my favorite food is, but I realized that after the marathon I could have had any food I wanted and I chose pizza, so it must be my favorite! Either way, I really love pizza.

Thank you so much for stopping by! I apologize about this post being so long, but when I do something, I don’t want to half ass it. Also, it was therapeutic to re-live this day. Seeing my medal and remember that I completed a marathon really motivates me and makes me realize that I can do anything. Cheesy, but it’s how I feel. I hope you enjoyed this post!
-Kimi

Close up of the medal

I DID IT!!!