Saint George Marathon.
Finally after 13 ish marathons....I finally qualified for Boston!!!! I was begining to think something was seriously wrong with me!!!! Granted, the first 7 of these marthons were completly for fun...I didn't really know what a "pace" was or what "Boston" was!!!
This race, I decided with a totally different strategy. Instead of going all out for the time I think I deserved and trained for...I decided to go for a BQ and thats it!!! So let me explain. The last several marathons where I wanted to qualify for Boston. I would train and the day of the race I wanted to get the most amazing time I could possibly get with my training. All these attempts seemed to fail. Mainly due to, I went out to hard or to fast and then at the end of every race I crashed and burned and would end of minutes away from my BQ goal. So this time, I wanted to race for the forsure thing. I needed a 3:40:00 or under. I printed off 2 pace bands. One that had a pace of 3:40 and one of 3:35. I laminated them even!!!!!!! My plan was to do a 3:35 and stay at that. If I was going faster at anytime in the race I was going to SLOW DOWN! (The 3:40 pace band was my "just incase" band!).
The morning of:
Rode the bus up with my 2 training buddies. Court and Haley. On the Bus ride up they told me they were going to start with the 3:15 pacer. And just "see" what happens. I think they weren't going to run that fast, but still not sure. I immediately told them, I wasn't going to do that and wished them the best! I also rode up with my cousin from Vegas Marylynn. Her plan was to run a 3:30 marthon. So again, I was out! On the bus as well was my good friend from High School, Amy. She now lives in ParkCity and was racing to get a BQ. Her and I had similar plans. I also need to metion my good work friend Heather S. She has recently gone though a divorce and several hard things. They day before she decided to run the marathon. It was her first. She was mostly trained and she wanted to do it as a "milestone" in her life and a "beginning" to her new life. I sat by her on the ride up and we had some great converstations!!
Getting off the Bus. I parted ways with most of my friends. I stuck with Amy and Heather. We hung around the fire. Had several potty breaks.
The race began. We decided on one more potty break!!! Then jumped in around the 4 hr pace group. Heather immediatley said she was solo and to have a great race! Amy and I were determined to "race smart". The first few miles of our pace band had us going a 820pace. We worked really hard to slow down and not get caught up in the race!
So This was the best race for me. We really havent seen much of eachother since HS. So I didn't listen to music until mile 18. We talked and laughed and had a great time. We stopped a few times to stretch. We stayed right on target. We would speed up or slow down accordingly.
Around mile 18. It started to get a bit difficult. Headphones in! But still mostly on target. maybe 30 sec behind. But doing great! Around mile 22 Amy seemed to dissappear. I looked back and didn't see her. With 4 miles to go, and a BQ goal. I just decided to keep going. Feeling pretty good. The heat was the only thing bothering me now.
Mile 24. Past my family. Legs starting to feel like lead. But pushing through! Mile 25....yes one more mile!!!!! I was going a bit slower than I shouldve at this point. I was doing a 9min mile, instead of my pace band 8:10pace. Oh well. I knew at this pace, I would still get my BQ.
Mile 25.5 My friend Amy came sprinting past me. At first I just let her go....then I was like, wait I need to catch her. So last half mile I picked up the pace!!! She still beat me by 10sec...but I was still sto happy that she was my "push" at the end!
As I crossed the Finish line. I saw Haley and Court. Even though we ran seperate races, we all came in 1 min apart!! Haley @ 3:35 and Court @ 3:37!!! Yeah we all qualified and hopefully will all be going to Boston 2016!!!
Haley took me home. I then was waiting for Ryan to pass. He didnt run one day this whole summer. YIKES! He was just going to walk the whole marathon. I walked 2 more miles with him!!! Man it was hot at this point!!!
So happy to do that with him, he was pretty miserable at the end and very sunburnt!!!
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