My Second and Last Marathon

By Guest Blogger Brian Deatherage

This is the sequel to my previous work of literary art “My First and Last Marathon”.    If my first marathon was going to be my last why did I title it that way you may ask?  Its because I forgot the tears, struggles and commitment involved with training for a marathon.  Mostly I forgot the pain.

This time though, I did it differently; I found a Coach.

My original plan after the first marathon was to stick to what I felt I understood and could tackle successfully, the 5-10K and the occasional half marathon.  But as time moves on and my memory of the pain subsided, I was coaxed into another marathon.

I looked at the on-line coaching options, read a few books, surfed the web, did more surfing, and looked at the local running shops to get some ideas on my next training cycle.  I can’t say anything bad about any of them, I am sure they all work, for the right person.   The best piece of advice I can give you when choosing a program: whatever method you choose, you have to be committed 100%.  The timing of my search was perfect, coincidental or fate?  I found a coach who is knowledgeable, flexible, persistent, inspirational, actionable and holds me accountable.  If the schedule calls for 6 miles and I run 5 I will get an IM very shortly afterward asking if I am injured, how I felt, was I following this week’s plan (as I have messed that up before)?  I could go on and on about my coach, but this story is about me.

Where do I start?  I originally had planned on only getting coached on the shorter distances – I wanted to be faster.  I have this notion in my head that even though I have been out of high school for 25 something years (and a little heavier, just a little J) I should be closer to the speed I had back then, just a little closer.  I picked a few races that I had run before that I wanted to run again – and beat my previous years time.  I chose the TMC Meet Me Downtown 5K, Run with the Rooster 5M, Jim Click Run N Roll 8K, and the Bisbee 1000 stair race.   My intent isn’t to brag about myself….well maybe just a little.  Rather than give you details on how much faster I ran EVERY race in I will share this – My Coach made me faster and increased my endurance.  Let that sink in just a bit.  My Coach made me faster.  Was I injured sometimes? Did I ever get sick? Did some workouts not go as planned? Did I doubt myself? A big YES to all of those, but I was guided through it all.  I only had to have the willingness and discipline to trust.  Wait a sec, I started talking about my Coach again, more about me!

Training was going great, I had a few bad runs every once in a while, but the good runs – they had great psychological effects on me (I already thought I was awesome, these runs proved it!).  And then…Boom…an injury fell out of the sky and I happened to run into it (probably because I was running too fast to miss it).  Hip Flexor Tendonitis, the very top of the quad muscle where it attaches to the hip/groin area.  The timing of this injury was about the same in the training cycle as last years marathon training– right when the longest runs and most intense training was going to toughen me up.  I felt defeated, robbed of months and months of training.  I was frustrated and a little mad at myself.

Apparently, there is this crazy new fad out called “stretching”.  Sure I had heard about it, but thought it was for the ‘older’ runners.   I don’t think I have ever stretched more than a few minutes before running, definitely not afterward.  Now I have an intimate relationship with my very own foam roller and “stick” to roll out and loosen up my muscles both pre and post run. 

I ended up missing a few weeks of training and when I started again it was on a reduced plan as my injury refused to go away.  This would have been devastating to the average person – it’s a good thing I am not an average person.  I was just going to change the way I kept score!  I was going to “fun” run the Vegas half with my wife (I am so proud of her – she did such an awesome job for her first (and last) half marathon), and then I would “enjoy” my marathon by running and walking.  As an analogy for those of you who haven’t run a marathon – the “joy” of running a marathon is like being tickled so much that it makes you cry, do I laugh or do I cry I don’t know, then after you get tickled you get run over by a bus – and sometimes that bus backs up to make sure it got you.

I had a few decent runs before CIM (California International Marathon) but still felt like I missed too much.  I had already paid for the entry, the plane ride and the hotel – so I might as well go and “enjoy” it.  My Coach had a slightly different plan of attack for me and more confidence in my running abilities – in her words I had “months and months of training and a very solid base”.    Her plan of attack predicted a finish time of 3:30:00 for me (did I mention yet that she is crazy?).  The bus ride out to the start always seems much longer than the distance – it felt like we rode that bus for 100 mile to get to the start. The bus was cozy until I got off to visit porta john row – the slight breeze and spread out bodies made it very cold, I started shivering and couldn’t stop.  With minutes to spare I made my way over to the start to join some friends – the start lines always get crowded and I warmed right up thanks to all the body heat!

Adrenaline always takes my body over, today was not any different – it really helped with my side as I did not feel any pain for several miles (also helping was the tube of some menthol smelling stuff that I rubbed all over my hip).  I was able to keep the excitement in check though and went out at what felt to be an easy pace – I needed to spread the adrenaline out as for many miles as I could.  The course was beautiful, at least the first 13 miles – a rolling country road with families in the yards cheering us on, lots of trees with yellow and gold leaves that had just begun to fall to the road.   On one of the little “hills” around mile 8 or 9 I caught myself pushing the uphill, I was feeling like I could really take off – but I knew I had to shut down those thoughts of wild and ambitious abandonment for the last few miles.  The miles were rolling by one after the other.  I never look at my watch during a race, and seldom on training runs – I run by how I feel at that specific time and knowing my pace may play mind games on me – I never look at my watch.  But as I was crossing the mat at the half marathon point I looked up and saw the time clock – dang it!  It was only a minute off my previous (and soon to be completely out dated) PR for a half.  I needed to ease back and relax, but darn it, I kept thinking about that time and the mind monkeys started up.  I wasn’t impressed with the second part of the course – I kept my head down and was staring at the pavement in front of me, I didn’t see much of my surroundings.  I did hear a lot of cheering going on though.  The miles continued to go by, but slower.  My feet were getting heavy, my hip was annoying and I felt tired.  Somewhere around mile 19-20 my pace slipped.  My focus was narrowing and I was concentrating on the pavement immediately in front of me.  Muscles were tired, little twinges of cramps from my legs and foot.  Yes foot, right in the arch – I have no idea how I got a cramp there but it happened.  Mile 22-23ish, my pace slipped quite a bit more, I kept telling myself it was only a 5k to go – only 13 laps.  I had to break up the distance into shorter segments as my brain was having difficulty wrapping itself around 13 laps.  Somewhere in mile 24 my body and mind were not in sync – the mind monkeys were there telling me to stop, to quit, to just be done.  The cramp in my hamstring and foot had me running all contorted.  The hard part about making the decision to walk is knowing how difficult it is to start running again.  I walked about 50 feet, just enough to let the cramps release their bite.  The next walking episode was somewhere around mile 25, walking might have been a faster pace than my running at that point as the cramp in my foot was robbing my energy and mind from moving forward.  You could have put a fork in me and called me done.  Off to the side there was a group of ladies cheering, I don’t know if they were cheering for a single person or for all of us but one of their group approached me – she was side stepping next to me with her face about 6 inches from mine.  Even with my mind numb this was a little close.  She was motivating me, she told me that I could finish, that I had to run, I had to run with her.  She was running in a side step kind of motion, still motivating me from 6 inches away.  Come on come on she said – a little surreal.  I am not sure if it was due to her motivation, or to put a little distance between her and me – but I started to run again.  If you call it running.  My legs and feet were all cramped up, I must have looked like that cozy bus from earlier had just ran over me and I was trying to get away from it as it was backing up to get me again.   As I got closer to the finish the course was lined more and more with supporters, cheering us on, holding up a lot of signs that I had stopped reading several miles before.   Finally the finish line was there – I wanted to turn around and give the course my middle finger, but I didn’t have the mental or physical capacity to do so.    I am not saying there was voodoo involved, but with all that had happened on the course, how on earth could my Coach predict my time to within 33 seconds? Official time 3:30:33.