The ultimate experience... My first marathon!

Saturday June 21st was without a doubt an event I will never forget. I will start from the beginning:

Thursday June 19, 2008

Scott and I hit the road for Regan International Airport around 5am. Scott stayed over the night before, simply so we would be able to leave from a central location that early in the morning. We got to the airport, parked the car and started in. Our first flight wasn't scheduled to take off until 8am or so. We checked in, got through security and found the gate. I couldn't find any TNT people! About 30 minutes went by and Megan called me. She was going to be our Staff Contact throughout the trip. She wondered if we were "close to the airport". I said, "close?! we are sitting at the gate!" Apparently we had jumped the gun and left the group at check in. They came and found us and we were ready to board. Off to Alaska! 

                                                       

We arrived in Alaska around 3:30pm, got our bags and headed over to the Howard Johnson in Anchorage. We checked in and split up to unpack and set up in our rooms. We all met up a little while later to head to the Expo and get our bibs. The Expo was help at another hotel, only a 10 minute walk away. There were lots of things there. Naturally, there were people selling T-shirts and other marathon items, but this was where we were going to get our timing chip and bib #. I was super surprised to find my bib number as low as it was, I was # 228. After we picked everything up, a small group of us (Amy, Coralita, Trudy, Todd, their daughter Kaitlyn, Mike, Andy and Scott) headed to find a place for dinner. We settled on Thai. It was obvious we all needed sleep by the time dinner was over!

Friday, June 20

Megan (our staff contact) is also my age. This made it especially easy to hang out. She and I sat next to each other on the second plane the day before. She mentioned she was renting a car and if we had nothing to do, we could go with her and spend the day sightseeing. This was perfect! Amy, Coralita, Megan, Scott and I walked to Enterprise, picked up a massive Expedition and hit the road. We took the scenic drive and it was beautiful. We stopped at every stop and made sure to snap some photos. So far, it seemed like an excellent trip.That night, TNT held a Pasta Party. How exciting. I had never been to a pasta party before and had no idea what to expect. We walked down to the convention center, and right outside were all of the coaches, mentors and other TNT employees. WOW. They were really pumping us up for the event.

At the Pasta Party there were several presentations. The first was the announcement of exactly who was from where. People were from ALL over the United States. There were tons of teams, some big and some little. Some teams made a lot of noise, while others tried to top them. After the announcement of teams, the mission of the society was talked about. There was a guest speaker who happened to write a column for Runner's World (one of the few magazines I actually read cover to cover each month!) He was extremely entertaining. He spoke of the "Bite-Me Zone" and a few other marathon quirks. The final speaker of the evening happened to be the honored teammate from another team. Although I do not remember his name, he stood in front of a whole convention hall full of people and spoke of his trying times battling cancer. Now that he is in remission, he spent the last 5 months also training for this marathon through Team in Training.

After the pasta party, we walked back to the hotel to prepare for a good nights sleep. It was hard to even think about sleep being we were all getting ready to run a huge race the next day. A race that many of us had never even though to put our bodies through before. We all met in the conference room of the hotel to decorate our shirts. This is where we took duct tape and wrote our names on the front of our race day shirts. Apparently, people on the side lines will call out your name for support if they know it. It was supposed to be super motivating!

June 21 - The Big Day

My alarm went off at 5am, which was when breakfast was supposed to have started for runners. I got up in the dark and found my way to the breakfast room, where - guess what - breakfast wasn't even close to being ready. The only think I could think of was... what about the people that need time to digest before heading outside!?! Oh no. I went back to the room where I proceeded to start getting ready. I had laid out my clothes the night before, the same exact way I had laid them out every other Friday night for the last 5 months of training. (That's not at all superstitious!) I began little by little to get dressed. Although I never had an issue with chaffing before, I wasn't going to let it happen this time. So, I put body glide all over the parts I know other people have issues with, just to be safe! The weather forecast the night before was saying 70 degrees by 11am and sunny the whole time. I put on my shorts, TNT purple shirt, pulled my hair up and decided to rock a purple bandana for the first time. Every other training session I wore white. I figured for the big day, I might as well be covered in purple! I pulled on my leg brace and headed back down for breakfast. I enjoyed a poppyseed muffin and a banana and quickly guzzled down a bottle of water. We needed to be in the lobby by 6 for our 6:30 bus ride to the high school.

As we all collected in the lobby, an announcement was made about the change in weather. Uh Oh. The weather was now only going to be a high of 55, mostly cloudy, chance of rain. RAIN!!! Oh my gosh. I had yet to run in a ton of rain and started to worry. What could I do now...? Nothing. We boarded the bus where I came to the realization it was super cold out. I had my bag of clothes for the finish line and held that on my lap to help keep in warmth. We arrived at the starting line and had to place our finish line clothes in a trash bag and put it in a van. This is where I had the brilliant idea of putting on a trash bag! The bags were clear and although people made fun of me for wearing it, it did add some heat to my freezing body. Not to mention, when the race started and it rained for the first 4 miles... I stayed dry! We stood around the race start for an hour, Andy, Mike and I and tried to calm our nerves, but this is when we began to think "what in the hell have we gotten ourselves in to now...?" But, we had started this together, and were determined to finish it together. We made use of the porta-potty's one last time and got in the starting line. The national anthem was sung and a gun was shot - the race was off!

                                           

As we began running, all you could see was a sea of purple. This was an event that was mainly run by team in training participants. It was quite a sight. Andy, Mike and I stayed together. We made each other laugh and kept each other going. It was going far better then expected. The rain was no fun, but didn't last long. We had heard horror stories about the 8 miles of trail we had to run. We approached mile 7, where the trail began and thoughts between the three of us were "wow, this isn't too bad..." Boy, were we wrong. The trail was composed of rocks, all sizes and mud - lots of mud. This particular trail is called the Tank     Trail. After spending time on it and noticing the "Live Ammunition" signs along the trail, it was obvious this is used for Tank training! So why on earth were we running on it!?I met so many great individuals while trying to make it through this part. Mike and Andy had forged ahead knowing I would have trouble keeping up with their pace. I was okay with that, although Mike had expressed he felt bad. It gave me the opportunity to meet other people and just complete the rest of the journey on my own. It had stopped raining by now and although I was taking opportunities to walk a few times, I was able to strike up conversations with other TNT participants from other states. One even let me use her cell phone to call my mom at mile 13! By the time I reached mile 17, I had to stop at the first aid station. Ever since our 20 milier, I had a toenail that was slowly turning black. It felt as though either my toenail had finally fallen off or I was getting bad blisters. I stopped at the first aid station, only to find out I had the beginnings of a huge blister on the side of my big toe. I wrapped it up and was good to go, back on track.

Miles 17-20 were excellent, I was able to just kick it and keep running, but by the time I hit mile 21, my hips were in pain. I found I needed to walk a good portion up until Mile 24. By the time I hit 24, everything had gone numb and I had energy I didn't even know I had left. At this point I was walking with another Maryland teammate whom I had met a few days before. Jonathan, the mentor (now Asst. Coach) from my team had found me and was walking with us. Several people were commenting on how they couldn't believe I looked so good. I maintained my smile and just kept moving on. Scott and the crew were waiting for us at Mile 25.  

                                                       

That was exciting. It was nice to see familiar faces after running through the woods. They were also a sign of "this is almost over!" which provided a great feeling! As I crossed the finish line, I made sure to keep a smile on my face - after all, 5 photographers were taking my picture. I pumped my fists high in the air and felt great. I approached the finish tent to find young boys bending over backwards to make me feel even more like a star. Andy and Mike were watching from afar and loving it.

Crossing the finish line was one of the most emotional moments I've reached this far in my life. The feeling of accomplishment was phenomenal, but it was also overwhelming. I saw Scott and burst into tears. It was all over. I wasn't able to control myself any longer. My dad called at that exact moment where more tears were shed. I couldn't believe I had completed the whole thing. I also couldn't believe I was still walking. My last and final thought was, now what. It was like a Wedding... months of planning for one big event - then what?

                                                                                         

That night, TNT hosted a Victory Party. We met up with everyone we had met on the trip in the hotal lobby and limped down to the convention center together. Andy happened to take note that we all had different ways of walking just to get through the pain. We all had a great time - they even had dancing (don't worry... I wasn't out there! That must have been planned for the spectators... : P ) We took dozens of pictures with each other thousands of ways. Anything to remember the bond we had all made in such a short amount of time...

                                            

Sunday, June 22

This was our last day in Anchorage, and really, we had no idea what we were going to go. Megan still had the car, which was great. It was raining and real gray out, but that was okay - we had to make the best of it. We all went to a flea market by the hotel first and looked around at handmade Alaska items. Then, the boys went one way, and we went another. A few hours later after some touristy shopping, we met back up and piled into Megan's car. Amy had the map, I was driving and Andy, Mike, Scott, Megan and Coralita jumped in. We took a drive over the a state park and climbed up the mountain. We parked the car, got out and hiked to the first stop off on the trail. Once you turned around, the view in front of you was spectacular. It was truly amazing to see something so beautiful right in front of you.

                   

That night, we all walked down to Humpy's for some authentic Alaskan King Crab legs. My oh my, that alone made me not want to leave the state! Dinner was excellent and the mood was right. We headed back to the hotel around 11 to board the bus and head back to the airport. Our first flight took off at 1:55am, Alaska time - which was about 5:55am, Baltimore time. We touched down in San Francisco to unload, and landed again in LA. We had a 4 hour layover and headed back to Baltimore. All in all, Team in Training was a wonderful experience. They have provided me with enough support and motivation to make me realize, that yes, someone like me can attempt an event like this - and totally fall in love with it.