Friday, April 12, 2013

My First Marathon

Well, I did it. My first marathon. I've a lot of feelings & thoughts about that and I will share them with you. I learned a lot from this experience; some not so enjoyable and some difficult but required. My main reason for sharing this information with you, is so that if you ever attempt 26.2 perhaps you will learn from some of my mistakes and save yourself from learning the hard way. This may become a rather lengthy post so I will break it down over the next few days. 

The week leading up to the marathon I got sick with a severe UTI and ended up in the Emergency room. I was told that I would be okay to run again within 3 days. Yes, I told them I was running a marathon. That was on the Tuesday. My family & I traveled to Paris on the Friday 2 days before the race. We drove to Dover & took the ferry across to Calais and then on towards Paris. We love the ferry ride, especially the fish & chips (french fries). We had rented a cute little apartment just an hour's train ride away from the race. 


On the Saturday, we took our time getting around and then went to the Running Expo to pick up my race bib. That was my first experience with a running expo and I would have enjoyed spending a little more time there, but it was extremely crowded & I had the family with me. They weren't really into it or the crowd. Then we walked over to the Eiffel Tower...mile 18 of the marathon, my focus. I knew I could make it that far. It was the last 8 miles that worried me...


We met up with Cindy & Jessica for a little bit & then headed to find a specific meeting spot so the 4 of us racing would be able to try and start together. After that my family & I went back to our apartment where I made us spaghetti and attempted to go to bed early...I'm not real good at going to bed early.

I got up at 5 a.m. so I would have time to eat. The problem with eating, I was so nervous I couldn't hardly eat. I managed 1/2 an egg and 1/2 a bagel, anything more and it would have come back up. Finally, I got ready. My heart was racing and even though I kept telling myself think positive thoughts and to take deep breaths...nothing was working!!! David thought he was going to have to give me CPR before I ever got started. When I put my heart rate monitor on it was at 100! My resting heart rate is 50-60! I don't think I had ever been that nervous in my entire life!!! 

I met up with my friend Darla...she is the reason I signed up for Paris as is!!! :) 


Darla and I ran all but the last 4 miles together. She is hilarious to run with, always on the look out for the camera. She would tell me, "Camera on the left, Camera on the right, now smile" or "Tonya, are you smiling?" The official photographers missed some great shots of her though...they should really hang out in other area's besides near timing plates. We mostly did a 5 to 1 strategy. You run 5 minutes and walk 1. I really enjoy that method & because of it we were able to snap a couple of photos. 



I am happy to report that Cindy, Jessica, Darla and I all finished; some more successfully than others but we all finished and we all learned a lot. 

Once I made it to the meeting point with the girls my nerves started to calm down a bit. Getting to starting pin was like walking on top of each other...think herding cattle. People were stepping on people and everything. Finally, we made it into the pin where we were literally right on top of each other. There was very little movement available while standing there and we stood there for 45 minutes - 1 hour (after the gun went off) before we ever made it down to the start line. There was close to 40,000 people there. 

The horrible part of this standing on top of one another and being herded like cattle was the fact that several of us had to pee. Funny thing, they had this type of urinal thing set up for the men to use within the start pin. So even though you couldn't see 'things' you knew exactly what these men were doing, as they stood there with their backs to you taking care of business  Now, I don't mind that - whatever, I've seen all sorts of things in France. What I had a problem with is they had those available to the men and NOTHING available for the women. So here I stood for about an hour needing to pee with no where to go - after suffering a serious UTI only 5 days earlier. I thought surely once I got to the other side of the start line there would be a line of port-a-potties...

...nope, not a thing. A ton of men standing facing the bushes...



Darla tells me, that there is a little green shack up ahead where her daughter had gone the day before and we made a bee line for it - only to find it locked. So what's a 'country' girl to do when she's got 26.2 miles ahead of her and she has to pee like a Russian race horse? That's right folks, I red-necked it up right there in the middle of Paris. I went right behind that little green shack and took care of business...I was not the ONLY female copping a squat.

I did not even see a single port-a-potty until about mile 5 and there was only 4!!! Why on earth would you have a race of 40,108 people and not have plenty of port-a-potties available? The 1/2 marathons I have done in England offer far more access to those than the Paris Marathon did. 

I'm sorry, but when you have that many people in one location they are going to need facilities to take care of personal business. I don't care if only 25% of the race is female - that doesn't matter, because let me tell you what those men were using those 4 port-a-potties too. 

The lack of facilities & the inside of those were one of the worst things I've seen. Paris is a little more red-neck than me and I'm pretty damn country! However, I could not wait to get back to my room and take a BATH!!! Those port-a-potties were by far one of the worst things I've ever seen and I've seen old people finger-paint with their poo (nursing home work). 

The Port-a-potties...
They had NO toilet paper. 
They looked like nervous tummies had exploded. 
They also looked like someone had grabbed the sides of them and shook the hell outta them. 

To use one, you couldn't wipe (probably a bad idea for someone with a UTI - running, heat, black pants, moisture = bacteria) and you had to hoover and pray to God that you did not touch a single thing in there because there was 'mess' every where. You know people were running that marathon with stinky hineys. Just the thought of it all still grosses me out. 

I understand sweat, sweat I get. I sweat - a lot! But that mess was just disgusting! I couldn't wait to be done with that race and take a bath. Perhaps my next race I'll pack latex gloves.

I will leave you with this disgusting information for now and finish telling you about the marathon in the next post. By the way, every body talks about poop, don't think they don't.

Up to this point my recommendations for running 26.2 are these:

  • Do not pick one of the top 10 largest marathons for your 1st.
  • Pack Kleenexes!
  • Learn how to cop-a-squat, if you don't know how...you just can't be prim & proper for this.
  • Do NOT run with a UTI - you WILL relapse!
  • Go to the Expo with other runners or alone, you're family probably won't enjoy it.
  • Eat plenty the night before - nerves may ruin your breakfast.
  • Smile at the camera's.
  • Run with someone! Keep each other encouraged and know when to let the other go.
I will have more recommendations for you at the end of the next post. Have you run a marathon? What would you recommend for a beginner?








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