26.2

6:45am Left apartment
6:50am Back at apartment to collect forgotten running shoes and hat...the essentials
7-7:40am Driving downtown, taking one last pit stop, and finding our way through the throngs of people to the marathon starting line, and lining up with my fellow 10-min milers (go, slow and steady!)

8am Start time- The weather was a balmy 70 degrees at the start and it incrementally got cooler and a little drizzly throughout the race, but overall it was great running weather. We covered parts of Bmore I hadn't seen before and some that was familiar (like a few mile stretch down the street I did a lot of training on, St. Pauls). There were over 20,000 runners between all the races (marathon, half marathon, relay), a little over 3,000 who finished the marathon (1100 women), so there were lots of runners around me all the time. After about mile 3 we were pretty spread out, though...I got emotional a few times at the beginning as it hit me that I was finally running my marathon!




Up until a little after mile 20 I felt pretty good-- tired and some aches and pains, but overall pretty strong. I ran those miles faster than I'd done any of my training, and it was a difficult course with lots of ups and downs. Then, after mile 21, my legs were hurting pretty badly, and the last 5 miles took me a very long time to finish. That was one of the toughest physical challenges I've gone through, because my body was yelling at me to stop, but my mind and heart were pushing me forward. It was a wierd experience for me to not listen to my body. I ran the last mile strong and cried when I crossed the finish line-- partly because I was so glad it was over, partly because I was hurting, and partly because I'd just completed something that I've always wanted to do.

12:43pm Finished


Check out the photo series below that captures me during the last mile, passing some other runners. Basically, I was really ready for it all to end!






The fans: Brandon (my greatest fan), Sean (my super supportive bro-in-law), and Ashlee Berry, former roommate who drove up from DC to see me cross the finish line

(post race and back at the homestead, posing with Ashlee Berry's sign)



I did it AND I got a cool Bmore crab medal and shiny, plastic blanket!


The Medal Ceremony (sorry, you will have to turn your computers to watch this!)