Or… How NOT to set a PR.

Even though I am a middle of the pack (sometimes back of the middle) ultra runner, I’m also a very terrible marathon runner. I’m decent at a 5K (I will occasionally age group), I’ve had a few sort of respectable half marathon times (PR is a 1:52:02) and I’m not horrible at 50Ks (I’m not great either). The marathon though is my fail distance. A raging dumpster fire if you will.

My last marathon at this point was 6 months after having my son and I made the mistake of trying to bank time to nurse him halfway through and I tanked. So this time, I was smart. I hired my friend Lena as my virtual running coach because I needed someone to be the boss of me. I will run stupid distances for fun but it takes a special person who has seen you acting like a trail drunk idiot at 1am to really force you to do the work you need to do to properly run a marathon.

Lena has not only babysat me (ok it’s officially being a pacer) on my last loop at the Devil Dog 100k, she’s done Boston several times and is much faster than I will ever be. Except for that one time during Devil Dog at mile 62 (I got lost and had bonus miles) when I got mad at her for not letting me drop and I said “FINE” and proceeded to scamper over rocks at a much faster pace than she was expecting because at that point I was an oversized toddler. To be fair, I did warn her and I bought her presents beforehand so was kind of bemused to see that I was in fact, acting like the drunken 4 year old that I promised her I would be.

The point is, I trained. I did sprints, I did long runs. I ran when it was stupid hot. I ran when it rained. We even bought a treadmill because the fires from Canada were hitting our area a lot and it was not safe to run outside on those days (this right here is foreshadowing). I ran my last long run on a day so hot that I had to hide under a hooded long sleeve so I didn’t cook like bacon. I was 100% going to PR the ever forking shirtballs out of this race. We had a super cute AirBnb and made it a combo family/anniversary/mom likes to do dumb things/ mini vacation.

We ate lobster rolls, we saw a light house, we even got a chance to visit with family in the area. That’s when we found out that the smoke from Canada was back and this time it heading toward the Portland area. I was frantically messaging Lena because the forecasts were a AQI of 89 and my lungs tend to lock up under certain situations with that being one of them.

We decided to keep with my plan of starting with the 4:35 pacers and then either staying with them if needed or drop them and pick up the pace at mile 17. I think my A goal finish time was a 4:15 and my B goal was a 4:30. I threw a face mask in my pack just in case even though I’ve never run in a mask and knew that I also can’t run in a face mask. My only asthma attack ever was from running through fog machines while wearing a full mask when I did a stint as a scare actor back when I was in my 20s so this was a genuine concern (my triggers are mostly super cold, smoke, and super hot and humid). The high was going to be almost 80 with bad air quality. I was big nervous.

I found my pace group and the race got started and it was going fabulous. They were a lot of fun and I was really enjoying my run. Until we hit the first major hill and my heart rate started to spike WAY higher than it usually does and I started to get dizzy and the wheels fell off. AT MILE 8. Spoiler alert, the air quality had gotten over 100 at this point. Thus began my sufferfest. The course support was awesome for this race…up until the 1/2 marathon split off and everything became sparse. There were some awesome folks out there still and I was super thankful for some of the homemade aid stations because I was chugging all my fluids by that point.

I switched to intervals and alternated between texting Lena and my husband and trying not to puke or pass out (why not both).

I got to the point where I kept asking every aid station about the cut offs because I thought for sure I wasn’t going to make it. I was queasy, my foot hurt, my fingers swelled like crazy, and my HR was spiking still. It was a 18.2 mile suffer fest. My low point was when the 5 hour pacer jogged past me and I told my legs to follow her and they told me to fork right on off.

Rude legs aside, I kept going because I’m stubborn as heck and my husband promised me snacks (this turned out to be a lie). I made the cut off by at least 43 minutes (finish was 5:17:49 per my watch). It was way off my goal and in no way a PR, but it was faster than my post baby marathon by a whopping 2 minutes (ish, don’t make me math) and it was faster than my virtual Boston Marathon that I did solo in my hilly NC neighborhood so I guess we can count it as a post 3rd kid PR?

Here’s where it gets a little grumpy. The race was already closing down everything. My husband managed to get me a small cup of beer while I pried my shoes off to reveal the worst blister of my life (I’ll save you guys the horror of that photo), but all the post festival food they promised? Yeah that was apparently for the faster marathoners and the 1/2 marathoners.

There were still tons of marathoners behind me, but they were closing down shop way before the cutoff. I’m used to ultras when there is support for everyone and this just felt sad. I thought maybe we could buy a pair of flip flops from the store they had set up but they were closed up as well. So me and the family hobbled me to the car and we went back to the Airbnb where I ate a candy bar and sat my blistered butt in the hot tub and swore I would never do another road marathon again. 1/2 marathons sure. Ultras? Heck yeah, but this was the race that just ruined the marathon distance for me, at least for now.

To be fair, the heat and the air quality weren’t the fault of the race directors at all, and while those unexpected conditions were what derailed me. I was surprised that even with worse conditions, they kind of closed up shop before cutoffs. Would I do this race again? Eh….probably not, they had a good packet pickup and free race photos, but the lack of post race support was a bit of a bummer (that sounds nicer than soul sucking right?). As of right now, I’m done with road marathons (probably). We loved Maine and would 100% visit again but this race would probably just be a one and done for me.

I did learn that I kind of love having Lena be the boss of me when it comes to training for races and I now use her for my goal races (seriously she’s awesome, if you need a coach in person in VA or are looking for a virtual coach check out her site).