Behind the Blogger: My Marathon Journey

So this is something a bit different on the blog! I wanted to talk a bit more about what my marathon training journey has been like this year. I know, it’s not book related and is a bit of a departure from the norm on the blog but it really was a big portion of my life this year! So I thought I would talk about it here on the blog as reading and running are two of the things that take up my time!

It’s actually a little funny how this whole running thing came about. About two and a half years ago, being the die hard Seahawks fan that I am, I decided that I wanted– no needed!– to sign up for the Seahawks 12K race in Seattle. Because are you really a die hard 12th man if you don’t deck yourself out in Seahawks gear and run a 12K? So I signed up knowing that if I paid the money I’m going to train for it. I had only ever run up to about 3 miles (a 5K race here and there for fun) and a 12K is about 7.8 miles or so. Essentially more than double what I’ve ever run. I pulled up a training plan online, planned out my runs and went for it. It was a new year’s resolution and I’ve never been more thankful for that race and making that resolution because I don’t know where I’d be without running in my life now!

I slowly worked up my mileage. The beginning was the hardest — I would have to stop and walk, catch my breath, start again. I was slow. I got terrible shin splints that made me question if I could ever do this. (Spoiler alert: I still get random shin pain now and it sucks so badly.) But gradually, things got easier. I got into a rhythm. My breathing wasn’t out of control. And each week was sort of exciting: “THIS is the most I’ve ever run!”

And then after I ran the Seahawks 12K that spring, I signed up for another race. And then I sat there and thought “well… a half marathon is only just like 5 more miles, I bet I could train up to that!” Because something they don’t tell you about running and races? It’s so addictive. Especially when you’re goal and challenge oriented like me. I keep thinking to the next goal I could achieve. A higher distance race! A PR time! (Personal record time). Yes, I totally sat in my running clothes and whined about going running most weeks but I always felt amazing afterward! And there’s always a time during the run where you sort of hate everything but that runner’s high is going to hit eventually and you just forget it! Hahaha.

So I signed up for a half marathon for that summer and man, I remember thinking in the last mile “this sucks and I am never doing this again”. But I finished it and I was proud and a few months later when I got an email for a sale on that half marathon for the following year? I signed up again.

A year and a half and a few half marathons and multiple other shorter distance races later, I kept getting the question “oh so when are you going to run a full marathon?” I’ll be 100% honest, that question made me so mad most of the time. 1) it sort of feels like a slap in the face: oh so you only ran a half, when will you do a full? (um excuuse me, please go run 13.1 miles and then come back to me). 2) Why does anyone who runs a half have to be planning for a full? I love half marathon races! It’s a fantastic distance to train for and run! Not to mention, most people don’t realize how long marathon training takes – it’s not just something you can go and do. It takes hours (and hours) of running and that’s not counting warming up, stretching, cooling down, etc — it’s a whole process. Whenever I told people “no, it’s too time consuming, just not something I want to commit to” I’d 95% of the time get the response of “oh you can totally do it!” I mean, okay, great for being encouraging but YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND, I just said I didn’t want to make that time commitment, can we just let it go?

So yeah, you could say I was really really adamant about never wanting to do a full. To put the time commitment into perspective, when training for a half, on my long run days I’d be spending almost two hours running on Sundays and this does not count the getting ready/warm up/cool down/etc. It took up most of the day. I wanted to be able to do other stuff on my weekend: watch football, read, blog, etc.

Then last fall, I read a story about how someone accidentally got registered for a full marathon instead of the half like they were planning and ended up doing it anyway. And I was like, I bet I could do it. And once that thought got lodged in my brain, I couldn’t let it go. And then Rock n Roll had this great Black Friday deal for their Seattle race and how could I say no?? So I signed up and had a brief moment of panic (what did I just DO). I had a few months before hardcore training would start – I used the Hal Higdon plan, cut off a few weeks at the beginning since I already run quite a bit, and adjusted the weeks depending on if I had other races during the spring. I wrote out all my runs on a little training calendar and freaked out slightly.

And then it was a matter of doing it, every day, every week, waking up earlier and earlier on my weekday morning run as the distance got longer (never in my life did I think I’d be waking up at 4:50 to go running). But it’s actually nice and I now swear by morning runs.

I was plagued with shin splints for awhile, I struggled with replacing my worn out running shoes, realized my feet are now a half size bigger (what??) and had many woes along the way. But slowly, I worked my way up – 16,17,18,19. The last miles started feeling painful. Not just the normal soreness. Like just pain. Just… pain radiating everywhere. The day I did my 20 miler (which is what most marathon training plans have you train up to because running a marathon is so hard on your body, you shouldn’t do more than that before the actual race), I basically collapsed on the ground after and burst into tears because EVERYTHING HURT and I was like how will I ever run SIX MORE?! They say those last miles are mental, that if you’ve done 20, you can do 26 and it is true. Painful… but true.

My actual marathon? It dawned this gorgeous day and the course was beautiful. And hilly. It was horrendously hilly and I was swearing at the hills and especially felt mad at whoever designed the course as I stared at yet another hill at mile 21. It started raining at mile 24 which wasn’t nearly as bad as the wind blowing straight into me. But it was just one foot, then another, the breathing in, out, in, out, ignoring everything that makes you want to just collapse. Apparently the first words I said to my husband afterward was “I’m never doing this again”. I have NO recollection of this. Because the next day I told him I’d totally do it again. HA. Why? It’s a sense of accomplishment. It’s this huge thing that you put your mind to and you DID IT. It’s a sense of camaraderie with your fellow runners, the ones near you when you both stare at the hill and each other like wtf, why, and the ones that know just what you’re feeling, the ones that are just as crazy as you and would totally do it again in a heartbeat.

I reread Breathe, Annie, Breathe by Miranda Kenneally before my marathon and loved it so much more after having gone through those runs, the stomach issues, the pain, the i-can’t-do-it phases. I highly recommend the book for those who want a powerful, emotional contemporary but even more so if you’re a runner! It’s fantastic.

So anyway, that’s my marathon story. It was a crazy 3.5 months that’s for sure. I’m not sure when my next one will be, but I know I’ll definitely want to do another. 😉

What are some things that you love doing when you’re not reading or blogging? Tell me about them! I’d love to hear about it!

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