Thursday, October 14, 2004

-Busy, Busy, Busy-
Things have been realy crazy for me the past two weeks. Work is extremley busy, getting ready for Thanksgiving Weekend, and prepareing for the marathon, all made things a little hectic. Two of those issues have now passed, but I am still very busy at work.
We had a really nice Thanksgiving weekend, Jen's parents came up and stay with us for Sunday and Monday. Jen and I decided that we would like to host the Thanksgiving dinner at our place on Sunday. That meant that my mom and dad and Neal(home from Montreal) along with Jen's mom and dad, Keir, Jen and I were all going to be at our place on Sunday afternoon/night.
Everything went really well, the food was very good (everyone brought something for the meal) and with the exception of the chicken (my responsability) taking double the time that it was supposed to cook everything went off without a hitch. Did I mention I couldn't walk while I was preparing the meal? That's because I ran in a marathon in the morning!

The marathon went well, and I was pleased with my time 3:27:54 (my goal was to go under 3hrs 30mins). I learned a LOT from the whole expireince.
The course was very hilly which I wasn't expecting(Lesson Learned #1: examine the terrain you will be running on BEFORE you get to the race course) but throughout the first lap, 21.1km, I felt really good. I had a goal pace time and was actually running a little to fast and had to slow myself down a couple of times, but didn't do that good of a job beacuse I did the first lap 5 mins faster than I had planned.(Lesson Learned #2: stick to your plan!) I had planned to try and run the 2nd lap a little faster than the first, but it didn't work out that way. The two main factors in preventing me from accomplishing that was the temperature/wind (it was really cold that day with a strong wind) and the second half of the hills took a lot out of me. By the 33km mark I couldn't keep my leg turnover at a quick enough pace. The most important lesson I learned was how much of a mental game a marathon is. I really struggled mentally from the 35-40km portion of the race. With the adrenaline of the finish line in sight I was able to finish strong.
Here is the proof that I did finish the Marathon:
Official Results
Photograhic Proof
I guess I pretty well, I finished 21st out of 99 people and 2nd in my age group. I didn't stick around afterwards because I had to get home to start the chicken for supper later on that day.
I really did learn a lot, and can't wait to do another!
I will let Jen update you on Keir, but he is still as amazing as ever!
That is all for now
Take Care
Ewan

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