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The 4th Annual Missoula Marathon was held today and I ran it. It was my first.
It all started at 4:00am…or, actually, 3:53am when I woke up, looked at the clock, and cursed because I couldn’t roll over and go back to sleep. I got up instead and shut off my alarm. I didn’t want to hear that god-awful buzzing anyway.
By 5:00am, I was on my way to the buses. The runners were shuttled from downtown Missoula out to the starting line in Frenchtown. As we were cruising down the interstate for what seemed like forever, I kept thinking “Just how far are we going? I have to run back. Can I just get off here, please?”. But, I couldn’t and eventually we made it to the start.
The start was nothing special. Just a bunch of runners lining up like cattle ready for a cattle drive. Then they fired the gun…or, rather, the cannon. Yeah. No starter pistol here. They fired a damn cannon. A couple thousand runners all jumped out of their skin in unison. They didn’t give us much warning and…it…was…LOUD!
The race started and I settled in to my pace…a nice easy 9mins per mile. I had positioned myself about half way between the 3:50 and 4:00 pacers and I was determined to stay there. At one point, I started to catch up to the 3:50 pacer, but I forced myself to back off. As a result, I ran the first half almost exactly like I wanted to. They were calling of times at the half-way point and I crossed at 1:56. Perfect.
If only I could have stopped at that point. Right after the 13 mile mark is where you hit the hill on Big Flat Road. It’s a long steep hill the turns into a roller coaster ride of numerous small hills at the top. This continues until mile 15. This is what did me in. I felt great when I crossed mile 13…not so much at mile 15. By mile 16, I was getting a little worried because fatigue was setting in pretty quickly. By mile 18, thoughts of walking were starting to pop into my mind. But, I refused to walk before mile 20. My longest training run was 20 miles so I knew I could go that distance. I told myself I couldn’t walk before then. Of course, that means I was indirectly giving myself permission to walk after that. Oops.
I was hurting as mile 20 rolled around and, predictably, succumbed to walking shortly after crossing the mile mark. But, I knew (from training run experience) that if I walked too long, I would be able to start running again. And there was no way I was walking the last 6 miles. So after a very short walk, I forced myself to start running again. This pattern pretty much continued for the rest of the race. Short walks, followed by running as far as I could until I felt compelled to walk again.
Mile 21 past…then mile 22. If I hit the wall at mile 20, then mile 23 is where I climbed over it only to have it fall on top of me. I started having serious doubts that I could finish even with the walking. It just didn’t seem like I had enough left for another 3 miles. It didn’t help that spectators would starting saying things like, “Keep going. You’re almost there!” Almost there??? Right. I have 3 miles to go and I want to lay down and cry. But, thanks for coming out.
(Side note: to all you Missoulians who had sprinklers that sprayed cold water into the road…I love you. They were so nice.)
Somehow, I managed to keep going, passing mile 24, mile 25, and eventually even mile 26 as I turned on to Higgins Ave for the final 0.2 miles. Up to this point I figured my desired finishing time was long since history. With all the walking, I assumed I was well over the 4:30 mark. It just seemed that way. However, as I crossed the bridge I saw the official clock and it said 4:15. Suddenly, I had extra energy again. My body was holding out me. I picked up the pace and cruised through the finish line at 4:16:31, my official time.
I ran in my Vibram FiveFinger KSO’s and they performed beautifully. No blisters. No toenails lost. My feet were tired at the end, understandably, but other than that they were fine. In fact, as I write this my feet feel completely recovered. Can’t say the same about the rest of my legs. I was a little surprised that I didn’t see anyone else running in FiveFingers. They don’t know what they’re missing. I had quite a few people ask about them, though. I imagine next year you’ll see more people wearing them. They seem to be growing in popularity.
So that was my first marathon. Right now, I couldn’t be talked into doing another, but that may change as the memories start to fade. It would be nice to break 4 hours, after all. So we’ll see.
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