Yesterday I finally ran the marathon I had been training 3 months for. I am happy that it is over and I although I did improve my PR by 25 minutes and came in within the time frame I wanted, I am definitely not completely satisfied. I went out too fast, which is the mistake I always seem to make. I was feeling really good when I started out and for the first 13 miles so I got a little too big for my britches and around mile 17, I started slowing down and hit the notorious wall. That coupled with the wind prevented me from achieving my 4 hour goal and ended up with the time of 4:20.
I am not completely disapointed, but there is always room for improvement. I know that I put all the effort into it that I possibly could, but I wasnt smart and made mistakes. Overall, I am pleased but in the back of my mind I know I can do better and because of that I will most likely attempt 26.2 miles again in the future. But not anytime soon. I am looking forward to getting back to the gym and being able to workout without the pressure and rigidity of training. I would like to take some yoga classes and do some bike riding and try new weight training techniques. I will still run but for fun and not be so focused on hitting a certain mileage or speed. By next fall, I should feel ready to try it again.
I was also very impressed with the inagural marathon that Fresno put on. They did a superb job and I never encountered any hiccups that can occur in larger marathons. They had plenty of water and gatorade, a ton of volunteers and the course was clearly marked. And although in theory the hot breakfast and ice cream sundae sounds excellent, I was in no condition to enjoy that. There were a lot more spectators than I expected and that is always nice to see.
And speaking of spectators I am incredibly grateful that my parents, Kendall, Rob, Adam, Ed, Heather, Mike, Brian, Annie and Reagan all came out to support me. It really meant a lot to me to have everyone there to see what marathons are like and understand this aspect of my life. So thank you, it made my day:)
As far as how I am feeling today, I feel really great. The only thing that is sore are my calves and even that isnt very bad. I anticipated a better recovery but this was even better than I expected. Sometimes the soreness doesnt set in until 2 days later though so hopefully tomorrow I will still feel good.
Thanks again to all of you and next year, I will do even better. I may need some people at around mile 5 yelling at me to slow down though:)
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6 comments:
and i'm going to look into a pair of rollerblades ;)
it was weird how proud i felt of you when you came by. i mean, i'm generally pumped for the athletes i work with when they're competing, but outside of saying you might be anemic i can't say i've contributed to your marathon prep over the last year.
great work. especially a 25 minute p.r., that is freakin huge.
maybe i'll coach you on sticking to your pace better. or get the head coach @ fpu to do that. if nothing else, our distance runners are great @ getting to their pace and sticking to it. which can be quite maddening when you're watching a 10k and your runners are sitting @ the back and you want to tell them to get their rears up farther. and then over the distance of the race, they end up ahead of all those undisciplined runners.
btw, the guy that won the half marathon is a former fpu marathoner. he ran his best time for a half, and the head coach said it was the race of his life.
good job, kasey!!!!!!!
Good job Kasey! I have to admit that I got a little choked up when I saw you round the bend. It was quite the inspiration.
You guys are warming my heart:) Such nice things to say, making me all warm and fuzzy inside.
I assume you will be back to teasing and making fun of me Wednesday?I am going to bask in this until then just so you know.
You just bask away.
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