four stars

The 7:00 am start of the Stars & Stripes Marathon

I had no idea how two marathons would go when I signed up for the Firecracker Double high on the endorphins of qualifying for the Marathon Maniacs.  But since the two marathons were just $25.00 each, and I could get four maniac stars, I couldn't resist.

And then spring struck, and my training went to crap.  I topped out at 110 miles in May - not the mileage I wanted to have heading in to this.  I really wondered if I could pull it off at all.  Just a few days before, I thought about pulling the plug on the idea.  I couldn't get a handle on my allergies; I was undertrained - I thought of every excuse in the book.

You're doing the marathons, my husband told me.

Running with Sarah & Rob

Thankfully, I had my friend Sarah running with me.  Can I tag along with you? I asked her, hoping she would be cool with that.  I don't know what I would have done had she said no!   So she set a course for us - run .4 miles, walk .1.  Over and over.  And that's just what we did as we looped around and around Greenlake Park.  10 times.  We picked up another maniac, Rob, in the first loop, and just chatted our way through it.

No speed records were broken.  It took us a little over 5 1/2 hours, but after we finished, I realized that I didn't feel all that bad.  My legs were tired, but they weren't dead.  I soaked in the tub after I got home, took a nap, refueled on every food in sight, and went to bed early.

When I first woke up Sunday morning, I had a moment of panic.  I felt like I had run a marathon the day before.  Duh.  And I wasn't supposed to do this again?

Freedom Marathon smiles

But I thought about the friends I would see there, and I got ready and headed out to the course at 5:45 am.  I arrived with just a few minutes to spare, and then we were off.  Again.

We started out with Rob and legendary maniac Larry Macon - a 12 time 50 states finisher.  12 times.  50 states.  Mind boggling.  I could have listened to him describe all the marathons he had done for the entire day (the man is a running catalog!), but we gradually started leaving them behind.  Amazingly, my legs were feeling pretty good.  The aches and pains worked themselves out.  This was going to happen.

As we headed in to the 1/2 marathon turn around point, we realized that the overall winner was just behind us and was going to beat us in to the finish before we reached the 1/2 mark.  I had to try to outkick him.  I did.  And so I gave it everything I had, but the dude turned on the wheels!  (He was running a 2:50 ish marathon after running one the day before...)  He came up to me after and told me I had some serious speed - which was as great a compliment as I've ever received.

About this time our friend Jodi came in behind us, so we were excited to have her run with us.  Except that she was running really well, so she decided to keep on going and aim for a PR.  A little sad, we wished her luck.

.25 mile later, we watched her turn around and come back to us.  "I could PR, " she said, "but I want my friends!"  Amen to that!

And so we ran and chatted and ran some more.  The popsicles at mile 19 were DELICIOUS!!!

Heavenly popsicles!

Mile by mile, we got it done.

A sweet finish.

And that's how I earned my four stars for the marathon maniacs.  You don't have to be a running badass.  You don't have to train 60 miles a week.  But you do have to be willing to perform to what your body will let you do the day. You will have to adjust your expectations for how fast you will run.  

The greatest thing I've learned from the marathon maniacs is that there are more reasons to run marathons than just improving your time.  You can run for friendship. You can run for laughs. You can run to find what you are made of. With any kind of luck, you'll find all three.