26.2 Things about The Donna Marathon

26.2 Things About the Donna Marathon

1.    Atlantic Beach is beautiful.  Amazing. You’re grateful that you got to stay one block away from the beach with one of your favorite’s cousins.  Arriving to 80 degrees weather, a 1.5 mile walk on the beach to get to “Town Center,” is a requirement.

2.    Eating at the Flying Iguana was yummy.   Roasted veggie tacos and fresh, table-side made guacamole are fantastic ways to carb-load!

3.    The expo was fun – pretty standard.  Lots of giveaways of stuff you probably don’t need, but grabbed anyway.  One of your gal-pals pretty much knew every vendor. No surprise, since it was like her 153^rd marathon or something crazy like that!

4.    Watching the sunrise on the beach the day before race day is awe-inspiring.

5.    Feel absolutely crazy when you can’t find your hat you know you packed.  Dump out bag.  Still no hat.  Look in car. Still no hat.  Hosts with the mosts find you a hat to wear.  Shakeout runs in 20+ gusts are hard.

6.    Prepping for race day “hydrating” and games of Dominoes are a great ways to spend a blustery, gusty Saturday afternoon (and race-eve!). Oh, and, said missing hat reappears!  It fell of your bag into the front bedroom when you were walking through.  Things are looking up!

7.    Race morning – coffee and water do their job and you’re feeling like a champ and ready to run. Race anxiety mounts and you’re not sure why.  You have no goals except to have fun and finish.  Maybe because you know you’ve been pretty slack with training, except for the last month and a half?  Or the prospect of no bathrooms?

8.    Race starts. You’re running down a commercial highway and wondering why you do this to yourself over and over.  You get in your head a little bit.  Your outer knee begins to hint around it isn't a huge fan of the grade in the roads.

9.    Hit the neighborhoods and the block parties start.  The 48 ounces of water and 2 cups of coffee hit you – time to find a porta-potty. You tell your friend at mile 4 you’re going to stop to pee and fuel and you’ll catch up with her (you’ve both trained to “stop” at mile 4 to fuel, so this was a planned stop – but not to pee).

10.  You pee, fuel, grab a water and a gatorade and start to hunt down Rachael.  You look at your watch and are running 7:40’s.  Yikes. Gonna pay that back with interest later in the race.

11.  Start to think about your plan without Rachael. Since you planned to run with your friend, you didn’t bring earbuds.  Start to think about how much time you’re going to lose when you get to Rachael’s cousin’s house if you run upstairs and dig through your bag to find them. After Hat-iatus of 2019, you realize you probably won't ever even find them.

12.  Woot!  There’s Rachael!  Course narrows and Rachael tells you to go ahead.  Legs are itching to run a little faster, so you decide to separate.

13.  Mile 8 – that’s YOUR block!  See Rachael’s husband and cousin with beer.  Start to chug and see Rachael coming.  Chat for a minute and you both take off (without going inside to look for earbuds).

14.  Outside of knee is hurting from the grade in the road. Try to find the flattest part of the road to doctor it up a tad.  It’s time for that permagrin!  Because you choose your attitude and it’s hard to be pissy with a big smile on your face!

15.  Course support for the first half is amazing. Grab some beer from some of the block parties.  Smile non-stop and thank all of the volunteers and police officers for being out there.

16.  2^ndhalf, course support dwindles a little. Hit mile 12 and 16 aid stations – water only.  No Gatorade. You need Gatorade.  Your body is used to sport beans, water and Gatorade every 4 miles in a race.  Try to think through how to compensate.

17.  Mile 18 – you hear the volunteers yell, “Gatorade!” Although it’s not a planned stop, you grab Gatorade.  You’re still feeling pretty good. 

18.  You’re still smiling non-stop.  Everyone comments – “Look at her, she’s still smiling after x miles.”  Actually had one older guy say, “Look! There is she!  We’ve been waiting on you all day!”  I said, “Hi!” like we were best friends, but had no idea who he was.  As I passed, I heard him say to his wife, “That’s what I’ve been looking for all day.  Someone smiling so big and happy to be running today.”  Wow.  You’re out here to cheer on runners and I made YOUR day?  What an honor.  I felt so much joy bringing joy to others – just by smiling.

19.  You see a group of younger people (college age – to late 20’s) partying on the side of the road, and one has a huge cut out of cartoon-esque set of boobs (I mean, it is the race to end breast cancer!).  You may or may not grope them obnoxiously just to get a reaction out of the people as you run by – they loved it!

20.  Mile 19 – you turn around and realize why you felt so good. That. Headwind. OMG.  Horrible.  But, you still smile.  You’re cheering on runners around you who are giving up.  The wall is hard.  That wind was hard. However, the faster you run, the faster you’re done.  Let’s go.  

21.  Mile 22, you pass a spectator yelling, “Fireball! I’ve got fireball!”  Knowing that’s some of your favorite peeps favorite shots, you want to stop, but yell, “I want some, but I’m not gonna.”  You run 1/10 of a mile, say “F-it” and turn around and do a shot with the guy.  The crowd cheers, you tell the guy thanks, you thank your friends for being there with you in spirit (even though at that point that had no idea, obviously, and no part of random stranger’s fireball gift!) and you hear the girls behind you laugh and say, “She just turned around for that shot of fireball!” This isn’t my first rodeo and I have no goals today except to have fun, so there’s that….. All I could think is that if there was some Rumple on the course, it would’ve been a trifecta….

22.  You know you suck at running math and now you’re 2/10 of a mile off of the mile markers (that backtrack for the fireball!), but the spectators are worse.  Between mile 25 and 26, a guy yelled, “Less than 2 miles to go!” And you’re like, “No, it’s more like ½ mile to go.”  A girl at mile 25 came and told the girls behind me, “Less than 2 minutes to go,” and she was like, “No, I have almost 2 miles to go.”  But guess what? Still smiling!

23.  You see the finish line. It’s straight ahead.  Like a block.  Yaaaaasssss! Wait, what? I’m making a left turn?  But the finish line IS RIGHT THERE!  What a mind F.  You cuss in your head and are reminded of your very first marathon that ended in Park Circle as you circle the block. 

24.  Finishing sub-4 with beers and back-tracking and shots make you feel kind of like a beast.

25.  $10 unlimited mimosas at Joseph’s Pizza, calzone with vegan cheese and making the Joseph’s Pizza Instagram is a great ending to the race.

26.  Riding in a car for 4 hours right after your race may make you feel stiffer and more sore than you’ve felt in awhile – maybe since your very first marathon!

26.2 …(and, of course!) Anytime your body carries you 26.2 miles, you’re grateful and amazed and all that you’re capable of.  Regardless of time, finishing a marathon is no small feat and may make you tear up.