Question: Who pays $ to go run for four hours on a Saturday morning?
Answer: 7000+ people
The St. George marathon fills up FAST….
Meaning, there were actually more than 7000 people who WANTED to wake up at 4am and pay $ to run 26.2miles…
Are we crazy?
A little…
To my immense pain, my friend decided not to run three weeks before the race and I naively decided to run in her place. (Ridiculous decision, considering that I hadn’t run more than eight miles in over a year…)
St George Memories:
§ A Chinese fire drill in Vegas with luv from Carrie for Kristin
§ Café Rio J
§ The Expo: & hologram bracelets = “strength, endurance and balance,” I don’t think it helped Carrie run around the car yesterday, but we will all take one if it helps get us across the finish line tomorrow
§ Driving the course (which, even from the backseat of a moving vehicle, seemed forever long)
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§ Cooking a delish pre-race dinner together
§ Watching the sunset from our balcony, we had the greatest views
§ BTW: St George is dramatic with natural beauty. Just beyond our balcony at sunset, puffy clouds, rimmed in the setting sun’s watercolor of burnt oranges, sprinkled the skyline and lit the frontward face of mountain a vivid red. And, in stark contrast, the final rays of the day’s setting sun filtered the land’s vegetation with an assortment of bristly, green tones, obtruding spikes of silver and a mist of flowery whites. The jagged teeth of distant, sunless mountains could be seen piercing the sky’s deep inky blue. Stunning!
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§ The mass of humanity fighting to simultaneously load the buses
§ Starting line = music, breakfast, bathrooms and bonfires, under a starlit sky
§ First half of the marathon = taking all the craziness in, trying to remember to take note of the incredible sunrise and the scores of stunning mountains dressed in chocolaty-red mudstone, purple shale, grey limestone and orange sandstone
§ Mile 7 = slathering a massive quantity of Vaseline on my right foot’s burning blister
§ Miles 9-11 = one giant climb. Maroon 5 appropriately blares through my headphones “I am in misery…”
§ Second half of the marathon = hot, the scenery now unable to distract from the pain
§ Mile 17 = all the toes in my left foot tighten into a ball and refuse to straighten
§ Mile 19 = I see the balloons of a pacer in the distance; I have to find out which pacer that is….
§ Mile 19.5 = it’s the four hour pacer… I MUST beat this guy
§ Miles 20-24 = Walking through the aid stations to gulp down much needed water, while the bloody balloon guy passes me
§ Mile 25 = no more stopping for water, I’ve had it with having to chase down the pacer balloons
§ Mile 25.5 = people were literally passing out a half mile from the finish… L
§ Mile 26.2 = FINISH LINE @ 3hours 57minutes J
§ “We did it” pictures with my new “
I thought about taking a wheelchair to church the next day with a sign taped to the back saying “Jill Stead did this to me,” but I didn’t have time to get my hands on a wheelchair… J J J
And even though I couldn’t walk like a normal person for the next three days, it was totally worth it! J
2 comments:
wow I'm impressed! I can't believe you did that without training!
good word lisa - impressive. you are my hero. i would have only been on the sideline throwing water to you...maybe in heaven I will want to run?????
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