QCM Race Report - My First Marathon

Yup - won't be doing that again!   Queen City Marathon in Regina, September 12, 2010. Two of my dear running friends, Margaret and Cindy, and I, ran our first marathon.  The rest of our running group attended as our pit crew.

Here's what I liked:

• The pit crew wore funny signs and wigs to cheer us on.

• One second at the 32K mark where there was a sign that read, "This marathon just turned into a 10K".
• I can insert phrases like "That was the weekend after we ran the marathon," or,  "Well, it wasn't like when we ran the marathon, but it was a solid achievement", into pretty much any conversation.

Here's what I hated:

• Everything else.

That's right - I hated the long training runs, I hated how cranky I was the whole summer because I was so tired, I really hated that I didn't enjoy the race, at all, and I hated that once I didn't need to back down stairs anymore (about 2 days post race), I started finding bruises, blisters and chafing that I hadn't noticed to that point, in places too gross to talk about. 

When I finally finished the race with a time of 4:51:13 (No, not a typo!), I was a bit lost because there were a bunch of different people handing out medals then JOHN STANTON tapped me on the shoulder and said, "You just finished a marathon, I think you need a medal."  So he put the finisher's medal around my neck.  So, I guess I can add that to the  like list.  But then I have to cross off the one about bragging because when I said to Boy 1, "Well, I did just run a marathon", he said, "Terry Fox ran a marathon every day."
   

For now, I will stick to a reasonable distance the still respectable half marathon - 21.1K.  And I will only insert the braggy phrases into casual conversation when Boy 1 isn't around.