San Antonio Rock 'n' Roll Marathon Race Report

At the expo the night before the race

Mike and Zoe making it through the crowds at the expo.

We ate Olive Garden in the motel while I organized my stuff. Zoe was enjoying herself.

I got up at 5:00am and made it to the Alamodome by 5:50am. When we pulled up it was a bit overwhelming to see a line of thousands wrapped around the Alamodome waiting to get on buses (this must be what it feels like to wait in line at American Idol). But the line actually moved pretty quickly because they had (from my guesstimate) over 100 buses. It only took me about 20 min. of waiting in line before I got on the bus. From the Alamodome, I was shuttled with all the other runners to the starting line. It was so cool to be on a bus full of runners who were all nervous and excited just like me.

Once we were dropped off (at 6:40), everybody was in a hurry to get to the starting line. Not me though. I was car sick from the ride over (I wasn't expecting to be standing on a hot bus for 20 minutes!) so I sat down near the bag check-in trucks and had a snack of Gatorade and a Granola bar. There were scores of UPS trucks to check your "race bag" (i.e. jacket, warm up pants, etc.) which I thought was helpful (I was wondering what I was going to do with my outerwear for the chilly morning). I knew that I wouldn’t be starting the race until at least 8:00 so I sat in that spot and people watched for about 35 minutes. At 7:15 I went and checked my bag.

The race officially started at 7:30 but I was in corral #22 so I didn’t start running until 8:13am. Crazy! So it took 45 min. for me to cross the starting line!

During the first mile I was choking back tears because I was so happy and so excited that I was finally running a marathon. I decided back in 2002 that I wanted to run a marathon some day when I started running with my friend, Camden, and got the first glimpse that I could possibly do it. Anyways, during the first 11 miles I was having a GREAT time. I was feeling good. I was in a rhythm. I was high-fiving spectators who had their hands out. I was dancing to the live bands. It was amazing.

Then at mile 11 I saw signs for the half marathoners to get in the left lane and the full marathoners to get in the right lane. That was pretty cool. I mosied on over to the right lane. Then the split happened. The half marathoners took a left hand turn and the full marathoners kept going straight. 95% of the people were turning left and there were only a handful of us who went straight. I kept looking around at the few other people running near me wanting to high five somebody because it was so awesome: WE WERE ONE OF THE FEW DOING THE FULL MARATHON! But nobody was paying attention to me. All of a sudden I got real emotional and was choking back the tears again.

And that’s when I saw the really fast marathoners heading towards me (the course somewhat doublebacked to the starting point...otherwise who would want to run 26.2 miles than have to walk back to the starting point...The Office reference). They were running about a 3 hour pace and were on mile 24. What?! Awesome! We all (the slower people that were near me…still on mile 11) started cheering for them telling them how awesome they were and that they looked so strong and to keep it up. It was a cool moment.

And then at mile 12 we came up to a guy in a wheelchair at the 23 mile mark who was struggling to get up a hill (I was going on the downhill). He was having such a hard time that his chair wasn’t even moving. His coach was right there with him on his bike but of course he couldn’t help him. So what did we slower runners do? Cheered him on as we passed him. “You can do it! You’re doing awesome! Go go go!”. By this point I wasn’t able to hold the tears back any more. Okay, I needed to concentrate. A couple of miles later we had turned and weren’t passing the faster runners any more so I didn’t have a distraction.

And then I saw the 13.1 mile marker. Yay! I was half way through! Wait a second. Half way. That meant I had a whole other half to do. I had to do it ALL over again. Ahhh! I freaked out. I stopped and walked for a little while and gathered my thoughts. I’m not really sure how long I walked or what I thought about. But eventually I was running again and looking forward to the 20 mile marker because that was as far as I had ever run and I knew I could do that in around 4 hours.

Right after I regained my composure I was about to make a right hand turn around mile 14 and I saw Mike pushing Zoe in the stroller walking away. I yelled, “Mike!” as loud as I could over the crowd and by some miracle he heard me from a distance. He turned around, and ran back to me. I said "Hi". He asked how I was doing and I said good. He thought that he had missed me after waiting a while and so was starting to walk away for the 20 mile marker. Oh great! I wasn't running as fast I should have been, I thought...But he thought I had crossed the starting line 15 minutes earlier than I actually did. I was so happy to see him and SO happy I would see him again. Yay! So on I went.

The next few miles seemed really lonely. It was a very odd feeling. There weren’t very many spectators at this point and I was starting to get really tired. By mile 19 I was extremely tired and in a lot of pain. I looked forward to seeing Mike at mile 20. When I saw the 20 mile mark but not Mike, I got really sad thinking that I had taken too long and he decided to leave and go meet me at the finish line. I got depressed thinking that I had taken too long.

But then I saw Mike at about mile 20.5. I ran up to him and he was holding ibuprofen out for me. But then I started crying. I’m not exactly sure why. Actually, I’m pretty sure it was because of all these reasons: I was tired, my entire body hurt, I had never run more than 20 miles before, I still had 5.5 miles left, I had thought I wouldn’t see Mike because I took too long, I was so happy to see Mike. Anyways, I was shaking and crying so I couldn’t take the ibuprofen so I gave it back to Mike and told him I just wanted to finish. So he pushed me on and as I was running away I could hear him yelling something like, “Go go go! Mel, you can do it! You’re doing awesome!”. That didn’t help the crying.:) But it did help to motivate me.

For the next 3 miles I was really struggling. I was walking a lot. Mainly I was walking on the uphills and running when it was flat or a downhill. But there were a lot of uphills at this point (relatively speaking. It was a really flat course). At mile 24 I got a second wind and was so excited that I only had two miles left. So I pushed through.

Then at mile 25 the crowds were back. I can’t believe how much it helps with the spectators yelling for us. That last mile was the greatest. I heard someone yell to me, “way to finish strong!”. That made me feel really good and pumped up enough to run a little faster. More like shuffle a little faster. I will never forget the feeling when I rounded the last corner and saw the finish line. There were tons of people cheering for me and the others with me. I started crying again. I was so happy. I was going to do it! I HAD done it! Yay! As soon as I crossed the finish line I saw Mike and Zoe. Mike had a huge smile on his face. He was proud of me. I was proud of myself.

Crossing the finish line!

(this is a view looking back towards the finish line)

Most awkward moment: I was sitting on the ground people watching by the bag drop off area. I was sitting in front of a motorcycle store. A group of four guys walked up to the store and stood right around me in a semi circle talking about one of the motorcycles. It was really odd. Did they not see me?

Most inspiring moment: The guy in the wheel chair struggling to make it up the hill.

Hardest moment: I think mile 19 is when I really started to slow down and got really tired and achy.

Best moment: Crossing the finish line.

Favorite moments: Both times I saw Mike and Zoe during the race. All of the texts and phone calls I got after the race (Dad, Mom, Scott, Jen, Lisa, John, Phil, Natalie, Keith, Sheri) and how proud everybody was of me.

Most annoying moment: I waited in line for 30 minutes at the porta potty. After I finished there and was walking over to find my corral I saw about 100 more porta potties with NOBODY waiting.

Worst moment: Getting out of the car after the 6 hour drive home. I couldn’t bend my legs. Walking up the stairs was interesting.

Cutest Zoe moment: 1)the night before the marathon all the lights were off in the motel room and she was laying in her port-a-crib trying to sing the song: "Ooh ee ooh ahh ahh bing bang walla walla bing bang..." 2)ever since we got home from the marathon she's been saying "Great job everybody!".

Shake your head "of course" moment: The night before the race in the motel when trying to get some sleep (and get Zoe to go to sleep). Zoe could see Mike and I in the dark and kept leaning over her port-a-crib and saying "Mommy! Hi! Daddy!" And then she sneezed while her face was up against the side rails....She suddenly starting screaming bloody murder. Her power sneeze (gets it from Mike) slammed her mouth into the bar and her front teeth gouged a hole in her lip. We turned on the lights and she was gushing blood and wiping it over her face and hair (Carrie anyone?). We cleaned her up and settled her down to find it wasn't that big of a cut...in fact there was very little swelling the next day. But of course it happens the night before the big race away from home in a unfamiliar area....

Other random thoughts:
-I'm not good at running. I don't go fast. But I have a lot of fun doing it.
-I thought I could finish the race in 5 hours. By the end of the race I was really deflated and a little depressed because it had taken me so long. I cried, again. I got over that pretty quick though.
-I'm going to train a little better next time so I can hopefully beat my time at the next race.
-I'm taking this week off then next week I'm going to start training for the Ft. Worth Cow Town marathon in February. I'm running with my friend, Natalie, and her friend Jonelle. There is a strong possibility I will also be running the Austin marathon in February (two weeks before Cow Town) with Scott and Lisa (and Dad too? hint hint).

My official time was 5:39:35

I came in 4,497th place out of 5,904 finishers

1,830th out of 2,621 females

358th out of 465 females in my age group (30-34)

Click here for official race pictures.